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MUSIC   AND    POETRY 


MUSIC  AND  POETRY 

ESSAYS 

UPON 

SOME  ASPECTS  AND  INTER-RELATIONS 
OF  THE  TWO   ARTS 

BY 
SIDNEY   LANIER 


I 


NEW    YORK 

CHARLES 

SCRIBNER'S 
1898 

SONS 

'     '  '  J      *  '  '      t  J    ,     * 

;    ;  ;■•, '.';  .','.  .'';  '.' 


Copyright,  1898, 
By  Mary  D.  Lanier. 


SSntbcrgftg  Press: 
John  Wilson  and  Son,  Cambridge,  U.S.A. 


c  c     c 
«-    c     c 


.  «  •       *  «     • 


•   •      •  •     • 


:  •  •     • 


cs. 


SRLF 


Contents 


Page 
I 


\^  I.  From  Bacon  to  Beethoven 

->j  II.  The  Orchestra  of  To-day 25 

III.    The  Physics  of  Music 47 

^^^ 

^  IV.    "wo  Descriptive  Orchestral  Works  : 

"S  The    Ocean    Symphony  ;    Raid    of   the 
u 


^  Vikings 68 


V.  TiE  Maryland  Musical  Festival  ...  70 

VI.    Tie  Centennial  Cantata 80 

VII.    Tk  Legend  of  St.  Leonor 91 

^-          VIII.    N/=ture-Metaphors 95 

IX.    A  Forgotten  English  Poet T15 

•^^               X.    Tf.E  Death  of  Byrhtnoth       136 

«:              XI.    Chaucer  and  Shakspere 159 

XII.    Review  of  Hayne's  Poetry 197 

XIII.    John  Barbour's  Bruce 212 


•  M51i;]0 


Music  and  Poetry 
I 

From  Bacon  to   Beethoven 

THEinsTOCLES  being  "desired  at  a  feast  to  touch  a 
lute,  said  '  he  could  not  fiddle,  but  yet  he  could  make  a 
small  town  a  great  city.'  If  a  true  survey  be  taken  of 
councillors  and  statesmen,  there  may  be  found  (though 
rarely)  those  that  can  make  a  small  state  great  and  yet 
cannot  fiddle ;  as,  on  the  other  side,  there  will  be  found 
a  great  many  that  can  fiddle  very  cunningly  but  yet  .  .  . 
their  gift  lieth  the  other  way,  to  bring  a  great  and  flour- 
ishing estate  to  ruin  and  decay.  And  certainly  those 
degenerate  arts  and  shifts  whereby  many  councillors  and 
governors  gain  both  favor  with  their  masters  and  estima- 
tion with  the  vulgar  deserve  no  better  name  than  fid- 
dling, being  things  rather  pleasing  for  the  time,  and 
graceful  to  themselves  only,  than  tending  to  the  weal 
and  advancement  of  the  state  which  they  serve." 

My  Lord  Bacon  has  here  used  the  term  "  fiddling  "  — 
with  a  propriety  wholly  unsuspected  by  himself  —  to 
denote  the  whole  corpus  of  musical  art.  He  clearly  be- 
lieves that  in  discussing  the  value  of  musical  as  opposed 
to  political  affairs  he  has  expressed  the  pithiest  possible 
contempt  for  the  former  by  the  mere  nickname  he  has 
given  them  in  translating  the  mot  of  Themistocles. 


a  Music  and  Poetry 

It  was  just  about  the  time  when  the  wise  fool  Francis 
was  writing  his  essay  Of  Kingdoms  and  Estates  that 
the  world  was  beginning  to  think  earnestly  upon  the  real 
significance  of  tones ;  for  it  was  in  this  period  that  music 
—  what  we  moderns  call  music  —  was  born.  The  pro- 
digious changes  which  the  advent  of  this  art  has  wrought 
in  some  of  our  largest  conceptions  could  not  have 
been  foreseen  even  by  the  author  of  the  Instauratio 
Magna. 

As  for  Themistocles,  one  can  even  sympathize  with 
his  saying.  Harmony  is  little  more  than  three  centuries 
old,  and  the  crude  and  meagre  melodies  which  consti- 
tuted the  whole  repertory  of  the  "  lute  "  players  in 
Themistocles's  time  could  not  have  been  likely  to  charm 
away  an  ambitious  man  from  the  larger  matters  of  state - 
making. 

It  is,  in  truth,  only  of  late  years  that  one  can  announce, 
without  being  liable  to  a  commission  of  lunacy,  an  esti- 
mate of  the  comparative  value  of  music  and  statecraft  so 
different  from  that  of  Themistocles  and  Bacon  as  that  it 
affirms  the  approach  of  a  time  when  the  musician  will 
become  quite  as  substantial  a  figure  in  every-day  life  as 
the  politician.  There  are  those  who  think  it  wise  to  de- 
clare to  the  young  men  of  our  age  that  what  Lord  Bacon 
calls  "  the  weal  and  advancement  of  the  state  "  may  be 
as  fairly  forwarded  by  that  citizen  who  shall  be  a  good 
fiddler — always  provided  that  our  definition  of  a  good 
fiddler  be  accepted  —  as  by  him  that  shall  be  versed  in 
the  making  of  laws  and  treaties. 

The  amiable  Tyndall  relates  that  when  he  was  once 
about  to  perform  a  new  experiment  for  Mr.  Faraday  in 
his  laboratory,  the  latter  stopped  him,  saying,  "  First 
tell  me  what  I  am  to  look  for."     Following  this  wise 


From   Bacon  to   Beethoven  3 

precaution,  let  the  reader  look  for,  and  carry  mainly  with 
him,  in  the  following  discussion,  these  principal  ideas  :  — 

That  music  is  the  characteristic  art-form  of  the  modern 
time,  as  sculpture  is  of  the  antique  and  painting  is  of  the 
mediaeval  time  ; 

That  this  is  necessarily  so,  in  consequence  of  certain 
curious  relations  between  unconventional  musical  tones 
and  the  human  spirit,  —  particularly  the  human  spirit  at 
its  present  stage  of  growth  ; 

That  this  growth  indicates  a  time  when  the  control  of 
masses  of  men  will  be  more  and  more  relegated  to  each 
unit  thereof,  when  the  law  will  be  given  from  within  the 
bosom  of  each  individual,  —  not  from  without,  —  and 
will  rely  for  its  sanctions  upon  desire  instead  of 
repugnance ; 

That  in  intimate  connection  with  this  change  in  man's 
spirit  there  proceeds  a  change  in  man's  relations  to  the 
Unknown,  whereby  (among  other  things)  that  relation 
becomes  one  of  love  rather  than  of  terror  ; 

That  music  appears  to  offer  conditions  most  favorable 
to  both  these  changes,  and  that  it  will  therefore  be  the 
reigning  art  until  they  are  accomplished,  or  at  least 
greatly  forwarded. 

Perhaps  the  most  effectual  step  a  man  can  take  in  rid- 
ding himself  of  the  clouds  which  darken  most  specula- 
tions upon  these  matters  is  to  abandon  immediately  the 
idea  that  music  is  a  species  of  language,  —  which  is  not 
true,  —  and  to  substitute  for  that  the  converse  idea  that 
language  is  a  species  of  music,  A  language  is  a  set  of 
tones  segregated  from  the  great  mass  of  musical  sounds, 
and  endowed,  by  agreement,  with  fixed  meanings.  The 
Anglo-Saxons  have,  for  example,  practically  agreed  that 


4  Music  and  Poetry 

if  the  sound  man  is  uttered,  the  intellects  of  all  Anglo- 
Saxon  hearers  will  act  in  a  certain  direction,  and  always 
in  that  direction  for  that  sound.  But  in  the  case  of 
music  no  such  convention  has  been  made.  The  only 
method  of  affixing  a  definite  meaning  to  a  musical  com- 
position is  to  associate  with  the  component  tones  of  it 
either  conventional  words,  intelligible  gestures,  or  fa- 
miliar events  and  places.  When  a  succession  of  tones  is 
played,  the  intellect  of  the  hearer  may  move ;  but  the 
movements  are  always  determined  by  influences  wholly 
extraneous  to  the  purely  musical  tones,  —  such  as  asso- 
ciations with  words,  with  events,  or  with  any  matters 
which  place  definite  intellectual  forms  (that  is,  ideas) 
before  the  mind. 

It  is  to  this  idiosyncrasy  of  music  that  it  owes  the 
honor  of  having  been  selected  by  the  modern  Age  as  a 
characteristic  art-form.  For  music,  freed  from  the 
stem  exactions  of  the  intellect,  is  also  freed  from  the 
terrible  responsibilities  of  realism. 

It  will  be  instructive  to  array  some  details  of  the  work- 
ing of  this  principle. 

Let  the  general  reader  recall  to  himself  three  great 
classifications  of  human  activity.  The  universe  consists 
(say)  of  man,  and  of  what  is  not  man.  These  two  being 
co-existent,  it  is  in  the  nature  of  things  that  certain  rela- 
tions shall  straightway  spring  up  between  them.  Of 
such  relations  there  are  three  possible  kinds,  regarding 
them  from  the  standpoint  of  man.  These  kinds  are  the 
intellectual,  the  emotional,  and  the  physical.  Whenever 
a  man  knows  a  thing,  the  intellectual  relation  is  set  up. 
When  he  loves  or  desires  a  thine;,  the  emotional  relation 
is  set  up.  When  he  touches  or  sees  a  thing,  the  physi- 
cal relation  is  set  up. 


w 


From   Bacon  to   Beethoven  5 

Now,  whatever  may  be  the   class  of  relations  with 
„hich  music  deals,  it  is  «^/ the  first  class  above  named, 
—  the  intellectual.     This  has  sometimes  been  doubted. 
But  the  doubt  is  due  mainly  to  a  certain  confusion  of 
thought  which  has   arisen  from  the  circumstance  that 
the  most  common  and  familiar  musical  instrument  hap- 
pens to  be  at  the  same  time  what  may  be  called  an  in- 
tellectual instrument,  —  i.e.,  the  organ  of  speech.     With 
the  great  majority  of  the  human  race  the  musical  tones 
which  are  most  frequently  heard  are  those  of  the  human 
voice.     But  these  tones  — which  are  as  wholly  devoid 
of  intellectual  signification  in  themselves  as  if  they  were 
enounced  from  a  violin  or  flute  — are  usually  produced 
along  with  certain  vowel  and  consonantal  combinations 
which  go  to  make  up  words,  and  which  consequently 
have  conventional  meanings.     In  this  way  significations 
belonging  exclusively  to  the  words  of  a  song  are  often 
transferred  by  the  hearer  to  the  tones  of  the   melody. 
In  reality  they  are  absolutely  distinct.     Nothing  is  easier 
than  to  demonstrate  this.     Let  any  vocalist,  for  example, 
execute  the  following  passage  : 


Allegro  moderato  ma  energico. 


La    la     la    la     la  la  la  la  la      la    la    la  la. 


The  question  may  be  safely  put  to  any  auditor,  when 
the  vocalist  has  finished,  what  does  this  mean?  As 
long  as  the  vague  syllable  la  is  used  as  the  vehicle  of 
the  tones,  no  human  being  can  truthfully  say  that  the 
passage  (it  is  the  opening  phrase  of  the  Scherzo  m  a 
lovely  Symphony  of  Gade's)  brings  any  report  whatever 


6  Music  and   Poetry 

to  his  intellect.  If,  instead  of  the  meaningless  particle 
la,  words  should  be  employed,  the  case  would  not  be 
changed  as  to  the  tones  of  the  musical  phrase.  The 
hearers  might  associate  the  import  of  each  word  with 
the  tone  upon  which  it  happened  to  fall,  but  the  tone 
would  not  be  thereby  impressed  with  the  meaning  of 
that  word.  It  might  occur  a  moment  after,  conjoined 
with  any  number  of  different  words.  The  mixture  of 
meaning  and  tone  is  merely  mechanical,  not  chemical. 

In  other  words,  the  intellectual  relations  are  not 
affected  by  pure  tones,  —  not  by  the  tones  of  the  hu- 
man voice  any  more  than  the  tones  of  a  violin.  When- 
ever intellectual  relations  are  determined  by  tones,  it 
is  not  in  virtue  of  their  character  as  tones,  but  because 
of  certain  conventional  agreements  whereby  it  has  been 
arranged  that  upon  the  hearing  of  these  tones,  as  upon 
the  hearing  of  so  many  signals,  the  intellects  of  the 
auditors  will  all  move  in  certain  directions.  It  may 
strengthen  the  conception  of  this  principle  to  recall 
here  that  other  signals  than  tones  might  have  been 
agreed  upon  for  this  purpose.  Gestures,  indeed,  are 
used  with  quite  as  much  effect  as  tone-language  in  many 
dramatic  situations,  and  constitute  the  entire  speech  of 
many  persons.  The  selection  of  tones,  rather  than  of 
other  sorts  of  signals,  to  convey  ideas  has  not  been 
made  because  the  tones  had  intrinsic  significations,  but 
upon  purely  a  posteriori  and  economic  considerations, 
the  main  one  being  that  there  is  no  means  of  producing 
so  great  a  variety  of  signals  with  so  little  expenditure  of 
muscular  force  comparable  to  that  of  the  human  voice. 

This  principle  cannot  be  justly  embarrassed  with  any 
appearance  of  conflict  between  it  and  the  doctrine  of 
the  origin  of  language  in  imitative  sounds.     There   is 


From   Bacon  to  Beethoven  7 

no  incompatibility  whatever.  The  imitative  sound  will 
always  owe  its  character  of  word-progenitor  not  to  any 
intrinsic  meaning  in  the  sound  itself,  but  to  a  purely  ex- 
trinsic association  by  which  the  intellect  has  learned  to 
connect  it  with  some  phenomenon  having  a  definite- 
meaning.  To  a  person  acquainted  with  the  phenome- 
non of  thunder,  for  example,  the  sound  of  the  word 
"thunder"  might  suggest  the  phenomenon;  but  this 
suggestion  is  the  result  of  circumstances  utterly  apart 
from  any  intellectual  influence  communicable  by  the 
mere  tones  of  the  vocable  itself. 

Once  for  all, — for  it  is  a  principle  of  such  funda- 
mental importance  as  to  warrant  its  repetition  in  many 
forms,  —  musical  tones  have  in  themselves  no  meaning 
appreciable  by  the  human  intellect. 

Some  steaming-hot  quarrels  among  modem  musicians 
clear  away  immediately  before  the  steady  application  of 
this  doctrine.  For  example,  there  are  many  conscien- 
tious and  beautiful-souled  artists  who  deny  themselves 
all  the  glory  and  delight  to  be  found  in  the  so-called 
"programme-music."  Their  motives  are  unquestion- 
ably those  of  rigorous  conscientiousness.  Programme- 
music  has  been  held  up  to  them  as  a  sort  of  unclean 
thing.  It  is  indeed  no  wonder  at  all  that  the  steady- 
going  classicists  should  have  been  startled  and  alarmed 
by  the  tremendous  explosion  of  Berlioz  in  their  midst. 
At  this  distance  of  time,  the  quiet  thinker  who  has  not 
been  brought  up  in  the  traditions  of  any  school  can 
easily  see  that  in  the  state  of  music  at  that  period  a  clap 
of  good  rousing  thunder  was  exactly  the  best  thing  which 
could  happen,  and  for  this  purpose  Berlioz  was  sent. 
Unfortunately,  the  shock  of  this  vivid  genius  has  been 
transmitted  from  teacher  to  pupil  in  many  instances,  and 


8  Music  and  Poetry 

there  are  still  large  numbers  who  are  unable  to  examine 
the  question  of  programme-music  in  any  such  tranquil 
spirit  as  to  warrant  the  hope  of  a  philosophic  conclu- 
sion. When  it  is  examined  in  this  spirit,  it  does  not 
seem  to  present  great  difficulties. 

"  Programme-music,"  at  first  a  sarcastic  term,  has 
now  come  to  be  almost  technical,  as  denoting  a  musical 
composition  in  which  the  otherwise  vague  effects  of  the 
tones  have  been  sought  to  be  specialized  and  intellec- 
tualized  by  the  employment  of  conventional  words. 
These  words  are  conjoined  with  the  tones  in  various 
ways.  Sometimes,  as  in  Liszt's  so-called  tone-poem 
of  Immortality,  the  words  occur  in  the  form  of  an  ex- 
tract from  a  poem  which  is  prefixed  to  the  musical 
score.  In  this  case  the  hearer  is  merely  supposed  to 
have  read  the  words  j  and  the  effect  of  the  whole  pro- 
ceeding is  little  more  than  an  invitation  that  the  hearer 
will  please  send  his  intellect,  during  the  playing  of  the 
piece,  in  the  direction  marked  out  by  the  poetic  pref- 
ace. But  again  the  attempt  may  be  more  completely 
to  unite  the  words  and  tones :  as  in  the  "  Lelio  "  of 
Berlioz  or  in  the  musical  rendition  of  "  Paradise  and 
the  Peri "  by  Sterndale  Bennett,  where  the  words  are 
recited  either  along  with,  or  between  detached  passages 
of,  the  instrumental  music.  Now,  why  should  not  this 
be  done  ?  It  can  be  shown  that  programme-music  is 
the  very  earliest,  most  familiar,  and  most  spontaneous 
form  of  musical  composition.  For  what  is  any  song  but 
programme-music  developed  to  its  furthest  extent?  A 
song  is,  as  has  been  shown  on  an  earlier  page,  a  double 
performance  :  a  certain  instrument  —  the  human  voice 
—  produces  a  number  of  tones,  none  of  which  have 
any  intellectual  value  in  themselves  ;  but,  simultaneously 


From   Bacon  to  Beethoven  9 

with  the  production  of  the  tones,  words  are  uttered, 
each  in  a  physical  association  with  a  tone,  so  as  to  pro- 
duce upon  the  hearer  at  once  the  effects  of  conventional 
and  of  unconventional  sounds.  The  unconventional 
sounds  might  be  made  alone  by  the  human  voice  :  in 
this  event  the  song  would  simply  be  deprived  of  the 
intellectual  elements  imparted  by  the  words.  Suppose, 
now,  that  the  singer  shall  play  the  air  on  a  violin,  and 
pronounce  the  words  in  conjunction  with  their  appro- 
priate tones  as  he  goes  along.  What  difference  can  be 
detected  between  playing  the  words  and  singing  the 
words  ?  It  is  but  a  change  of  instruments :  instead  of 
the  voice,  which  is  a  reed-instrument,  he  now  employs 
the  violin,  a  stringed  instrument.  Why  is  not  the  latter 
as  legitimate  as  the  former? 

It  is,  as  I  have  before  intimated,  only  from  a  failure 
to  perceive  the  fact  that  the  tones  of  the  human  voice 
are  in  themselves  as  meaningless,  intellectually,  as  the 
tones  of  all  other  reed-instruments,  that  any  hesitation 
in  answering  this  question  could  arise.  Certainly  if 
programme-music  is  absurd,  all  songs  are  nonsense. 
The  principle  of  being  of  every  song  is  that  intellectual 
impressions  can  be  advantageously  combined  with  mu- 
sical impressions,  in  addressing  the  spirit  of  man.  It  is 
precisely  this  principle  that  underlies  programme-music. 
Yet  one  of  the  most  genuine  music-lovers  I  have  ever 
met  always  comes  away  from  Beethoven's  Pastoral  Sym- 
phony with  a  melancholy  sense  of  sin.  He  thinks  he 
ought  not  to  have  enjoyed  it  so  much ;  he  feels  that  he 
has  done  wrong  in  deriving  pleasure  from  an  inartis- 
tic attempt  even  of  the  great  king  of  tones.  "  It  is 
programme-music,"  he  says.  This  same  person  will 
listen  with  the  most  intense  delight  to  Beethoven's  cycle 


lo  Music  and  Poetry 

of  songs,  "  To  My  Love  Far  Away,"  for  example ;  and 
yet  the  latter  is  programme-music  carried  to  such  a 
development  that  every  single  tone  is  supposed  to  bear 
with  it  a  special  message  to  the  intellect  by  virtue  of  its 
amalgamation  with  the  conventional  signal  of  a  word. 
In  the  Pastoral  Symphony  the  suggestions  of  ideas  are 
only  made  in  the  most  evanescent  way.  There  is  not 
the  least  attempt  at  puerile  imitations.  The  Nightingale 
is  merely  suggested,  for  example,  since  no  mortal  ear 
could  ever  regard  as  an  imitation  the  orchestral  voice 
which  gives  this  particular  hint.  Beethoven  wishes  to 
suggest  a  definite  intellectual  image  to  his  hearer  along 
with  a  certain  set  of  tones  :  instead  of  employing  a  con- 
ventional word  to  accomplish  his  purpose,  he  chooses  to 
employ  an  imitative  tone.  Nothing  could  be  more  nat- 
ural, nothing  more  legitimate.  Why  not  hint  a  storm 
with  stormy  tones,  as  well  as  describe  a  storm  in  stormy 
words  ?  Why  write  one  way  for  the  reed  in  the  clari- 
net, another  way  for  the  reed  in  the  throat? 

In  other  words,  if  the  composer  choose  to  invite  our 
intellect  to  get  up  and  ride,  along  with  our  emotion, 
why  should  not  we  accept  ?  There  is  but  one  question, 
—  can  he  carry  double  ? 

Beethoven  could.  So,  indeed,  could  Berlioz.  What 
good  reason  why  we  should  not  mount  and  off? 

No  man  can  say.  In  truth,  one  would  wonder  at  the 
blindness  of  artists  who  persistently  keep  themselves  in 
leading-strings  for  the  purpose  of  avoiding  purely  fanci- 
ful dangers,  if  one  did  not  remember  how  music  is  yet 
so  young  an  art  that  we  have  not  learned  to  make  it,  far 
less  to  understand  it. 

What  has  now  been  said  upon  the  matter  of  pro- 
gramme-music is  not  at  all  by  way  of  digression.     It 


From   Bacon  to  Beethoven  1 1 

has  illustrated  in  the  best  possible  manner  the  main 
thought  so  far  insisted  on,  —  to  wit,  how  absolutely 
non-intellectual  is  the  effect  of  pure  tone,  insomuch  that 
if  the  composer  wish  to  carry  anything  like  a  cognition 
along  with  music  he  must  do  so  either  by  employing 
words  or  associations  such  as  those  suggested  by  imita- 
tive sounds  which  the  mind  has  learned  to  connect  with 
given  phenomena. 

A  point  is  now  reached  from  which  an  important  step 
may  be  taken  in  the  argument.  This  peculiarity  of 
music  completely  separates  it  from  all  other  arts,  and 
places  it  on  a  plane  alone.  One  of  the  results  of  this 
unique  position  has  been  already  referred  to.  On  an 
earlier  page  I  spoke  of  the  non-liability  of  music  to  the 
onerous  exactions  of  realism.  A  somewhat  more  de- 
tailed statement  of  this  idea  will  carry  us  far  on  our 
way  towards  an  understanding  of  the  satisfaction  which 
music  brinsrs  to  our  modem  needs  in  this  connection.^ 

1  It  is  made  necessary  by  some  former  experiences  to  add  here 
that  no  one  must  imagine  the  ensuing  comparative  remarks  as 
between  music  and  painting  (or  sculpture)  to  be  made  in  any 
spirit  of  billy  glorification  of  the  former,  or  of  equally  silly  depre- 
ciation of  the  latter.  There  is  no  question  of  merit  or  demerit. 
The  argument  is  merely  that  music  is  the  modern  art  because  it 
suits  the  modern  need,  and  the  attempt  is  to  show  how.  At 
another  age  painting  might  suit  the  need  better,  in  which  event 
painting  would  be  the  art  of  the  time ;  but  the  ensuing  remarks 
would  still  hold  good. 

If  any  further  profession  be  necessar)',  one  joyfully  embraces  an 
occasion  to  declare  that  the  rise  of  landscape-painting  seems 
surely  one  of  the  most  notable  events  in  the  history  of  art ;  that 
the  Americans  are,  or  arc  at  least  to  be,  the  greatest  in  this 
branch,  and  that  some  of  them  appear  to  me  now  among  the 
very  sweetest  preachers  of  beauty  in  all  time.  The  Frenchmen 
certainly  show  more  technic  thus  far,  but  never  such  seizure  of 
Nature,  such  Ptrasp  of  her  unspeakable  loveliness  and  nearness 
to  man. 


12  Music  and   Poetry 

Let  us  compare  it  with  painting  from  the  point  of 
view  of  realistic  necessities. 

A  painting  is  an  imitation,  upon  a  flat  surface,  of 
things  which  are  not  flat ;  it  is  an  imitation,  upon  a 
surface  lying  wholly  in  one  plane,  of  things  whose 
planes  lie  at  all  manner  of  angles  with  each  other ;  it  is 
an  imitation  of  three  dimensions  by  two,  and  of  horizon- 
tal distance  upon  vertical  distance.  These  imitations 
—  of  course  "  imitations  "  is  not  a  precise  word  here  — 
can  be  accomplished  because  human  vision  is  not  un- 
erringly keen. 

It  is  through  the  limitations  of  the  eye  that  painting 
is  possible.  Perhaps  this  could  not  have  been  properly 
understood  before  Bishop  Berkeley  unfolded  the  true 
nature  of  vision  and  the  dependence  of  the  reports 
brought  in  by  the  sense  of  sight  upon  many  other 
matters  which  are  the  result  of  judgments  founded  on 
experience.  It  may  fairly  be  said  to  have  been  estab- 
lished by  that  acute  speculator  that  we  do  not  see  either 
distance  or  magnitude,  —  that  is,  that  these  two  partic- 
ulars are  not  immediate  deliverances  of  the  sense  of 
sight,  but  are  the  results  of  a  comparison  which  the 
mind  draws  between  present  and  certain  remembered 
appearances  gathered  by  touch,  hearing,  and  other 
senses.  This  comparison  is  made  rapidly,  and  the 
judgments  founded  on  it  are  practically  instantaneous ; 
but  the  fact  remains  that  distance  and  magnitude  are 
mainly  not  given  by  the  eye,  but  deduced  by  reason  as 
inferences  from  several  particulars  which  have  been 
communicated  by  other  senses  in  addition  to  sight. 

It  is,  then,  this  defective  organ  which  is  practised 
upon  (of  course  not  in  the  bad  sense)  by  the  art  of 
painting.     Every   one,  therefore,    upon   approaching    a 


From  Bacon  to   Beethoven  13 

painting,  goes  through  a  prehminary  series  of  allowances 
and  of  (in  a  certain  sense)  forgivenesses.  These  al- 
lowances are  made  so  habitually  that  they  frequently 
become  unnoticed,  and  many  will  be  surprised  at  re- 
membering that  they  are  made  at  all.  But  something 
like  this  typic  discussion  always  occurs  in  practice  when 
one  is  before  a  painting  for  the  first  time.  "  Here," 
says  the  eye,  "is  an  imitation  of  a  mountain." 

"  Absurd,"  rephes  the  judgment,  which  has  often  be- 
fore tested  the  reports  of  the  eye  by  reports  of  the  touch, 
the  ear,  and  other  senses,  and  has  learned  to  correct 
them  accordingly ;  "the  mountain  is  a  mile  high,  while 
the  canvas  is  not  three  feet.    But  let  it  pass." 

"  Here,"  continues  the  eye,  "  is  a  representation  of 
trees  with  round  trunks,  standing  at  various  distances 
from  each  other,  along  a  wide  landscape." 

"  Impossible,  save  by  some  trick  of  suggestion,"  re- 
plies the  judgment ;  "  for  the  canvas  is  fiat ;  and  if  you 
look  closely  you  will  see  that  the  trees  are  merely  placed 
higher  or  lower  than  each  other,  the  vertical  being  art- 
fully made  to  do  duty  for  the  horizontal ;  and  the  hori- 
zontal itself  is  a  mere  make-believe ;  do  you  not  see  it 
is  just  as  near  you  in  reality  as  the  foreground?  But 
let  it  pass." 

Nor  is  this  all.  The  eye,  though  defective  in  the  par- 
ticulars mentioned,  is  equally  effective  in  others,  and  in 
its  turn  it  becomes  the  critic  of  the  painting.  For  ex- 
ample :  Is  this  really  like  a  mountain?  queries  the  eye, 
and  straightway  falls  to  examining  the  imitation  and 
comparing  it  with  realities.  Is  this  genuine  oak-foliage? 
Would  these  shadows  fall  in  this  manner,  and  is  their 
value  truly  estimated  and  depicted?  A  thousand  such 
preliminary  questions  the  eye  asks.     If  ihcy  are  not  sat- 


14  Music  and   Poetry 

isfactorily  answered  by  the  painting,  it  fails  at  the  very 
start,  and  there  is  no  use  in  going  further  to  examine  what 
aesthetic  appeal  it  may  make.  Through  such  a  vestibule, 
resisting  the  chill  of  these  cold  intellectual  considerations 
of  vraisemblance,  and  sobered  by  all  these  allowances 
and  forgivenesses,  must  every  soul  pass  on  to  the  ulti- 
mate purpose  and  meaning  of  a  picture. 

Now,  it  is  easy  to  conceive  a  stage  of  growth  of  the 
human  spirit  when  the  necessity  of  making  these  realistic 
comparisons  would  be  no  hindrance  at  all,  but  a  refresh- 
ment and  an  advantage.  In  the  mediaeval  time,  for  ex- 
ample, when  the  subtle  disquisitions  of  the  schoolmen 
abandoned  the  real  entirely  and  busied  themselves  with 
pure  figments  of  human  fancy,  —  when  bigotry  was  piled 
upon  bigotry,  and  fanaticism  upon  fanaticism,  until  all 
trace  of  the  actual  earth  and  of  actual  human  nature  was 
obscured,  —  in  such  a  time,  men's  minds  would  experi- 
ence a  sense  of  relief  and  of  security  in  contemplating 
works  of  art  composed  of  firm  and  definite  forms  whose 
accuracy  could  be  brought  to  satisfactory  tests  of  actual 
measurement.  Accordingly,  we  find  the  artist  of  the 
mediaeval  time  to  be  a  painter,  seeking  refuge  from  the 
instabilities  and  vaguenesses  of  the  prevalent  thought  of 
the  time  in  the  sharply-outlined  figures  which  he  could 
fix  upon  his  canvas. 

These  considerations  apply  with  still  greater  force  to 
the  antique  time,  with  its  peculiar  art  of  sculpture.  In 
an  age  when  men  knew  so  little  of  the  actual  physical 
world  that  the  main  materials  and  subjects  of  thought 
were  mere  fancies  and  juggles  of  ingenious  speculators, 
it  must  have  been  a  real  rest  for  the  mind  to  fix  itself 
upon  the  solid  and  enduring  images  of  undeceptive  stone 
which  the  artists  furnished  forth    from  their  wonderful 


From   Bacon  to   Beethoven  15 

brains  and  chisels.  The  need  of  such  rest,  though  not, 
of  course,  consciously  recognized  by  the  sculptors,  was 
really  the  reason  of  their  being.  In  such  matters  Na- 
ture takes  care  of  her  own.  She  knows  the  peculiar 
hunger  of  an  age,  and  fashions  the  appropriate  satisfac- 
tions to  it. 

Here,  now,  we  are  arrived  at  the  crisis  of  the  argu- 
ment. What  has  been  said  of  the  relations  of  sculpture 
and  painting  to  the  times  in  which  they  flourished  is  but 
the  special  application  of  a  general  underlying  principle 
which  may  be  thus  stated  :  The  Art  of  any  age  will  be 
complementary  to  the  Thought  of  that  age. 

In  the  light  of  this  principle,  let  us  examine  the  atti- 
tude of  music  towards  the  present  time.  A  priori,  one 
will  expect  to  find  that  in  an  age  of  physical  science, 
when  the  intellect  of  man  imperiously  demands  the  exact 
truth  of  all  actual  things  and  is  possessed  with  a  holy 
mania  for  reality,  the  characteristic  Art  will  be  one  afford- 
ing an  outlet  from  the  rigorous  fixedness  of  the  actual 
and  of  the  known  into  the  freer  regions  of  the  possible 
and  of  the  unknown.  This  reasoning  becomes  verified 
as  soon  as  we  collate  the  facts.  With  sufficient  accuracy 
in  view  of  the  size  of  the  terms,  it  may  be  said  that  the 
rise  of  modern  music  has  been  simultaneous  with  that 
of  modern  physical  science.  And  what  more  natural?  I 
have  endeavored  to  show  that  music  is  of  all  arts  that 
which  has  least  to  do  with  realism,  that  which  departs 
most  widely  from  the  rigid  definitions  and  firm  outlines 
which  the  intellect  (I  use  this  term  always  in  its  strict 
sense  as  referring  to  the  cognitive  or  thinking  activity  of 
man,  in  contradistinction  to  the  emotional  or  conative 
activity)  demands.  In  music  there  is  no  preliminary 
allowance  to  be  made  by  the  ear,  as  was  alleged  to  be 


1 6  Music  and  Poetry 

made  by  the  eye  in  painting ;  there  is  no  forgiveness,  in 
consideration  of  the  impossible ;  there  is  no  question  of 
vraiscmblancc,  no  chill  of  discussion,  at  the  outset. 
Even  in  the  case  of  programme-music,  where  a  sugges- 
tion is  made  to  the  intellect  by  imitation  of  familiar  sounds, 
the  imitation  is,  as  already  shown,  really  no  imitation,  does 
not  pretend  to  be  or  set  up  for  a  vraisemblani  representa- 
tion, but  is  a  mere  hint,  with  purposes  wholly  ulterior  to 
and  beyond  the  small  puerility  which  imitation  would  be 
if  sought  as  an  end  in  itself.  Moreover,  in  all  cases  of 
programme-music,  even  if  the  attempt  at  carrying  along 
the  intellect  fails,  the  music  as  an  emotional  satisfaction 
remains.  If  bad  as  a  programme,  it  is  still  good  as 
music. 

Music,  then,  being  free  from  the  weight  and  burden 
of  realism,  —  its  whole  i7iodus  being  different  from  that 
of  imitative  and  plastic  art,  —  its  peculiar  activity  being 
in  the  same  direction  with  that  of  those  emotions  by 
which  man  relates  himself  (as  I  hope  to  show  further 
on)  to  the  infinite,  —  what  more  natural  than  that  the 
spirit  of  man  should  call  upon  it  for  relief  from  the  pres- 
sure and  grind  of  Fact,  should  cry  to  it,  with  earnest 
pathos,  "  Come,  lead  me  away  out  of  this  labyrinth  of  the 
real,  the  definite,  the  known,  into,  or  at  least  towards, 
the  region  of  the  ideal,  the  infinite,  the  unknown :  knowl- 
edge is  good,  I  will  continue  to  thirst  and  to  toil  for  it, 
but,  alas  !  I  am  blind  even  with  the  blaze  of  the  sun ; 
take  me  where  there  is  starlight  and  darkness,  where  my 
eyes  shall  rest  from  the  duties  of  verification  and  my 
soul  shall  repose  from  the  labor  of  knowing." 

But  this  is  only  a  rudimentary  statement  of  the  agency 
of  music  in  modern  civilization,  intended  to  bring  prom- 
inently forward  its  attitude  towards  science.     The  musi- 


From  Bacon  to   Beethoven  17 

cian  is  the  complement  of  the  scientist.  The  latter  will 
superintend  our  knowing ;  the  former  will  superintend 
our  loving. 

I  use  this  last  term  advisedly,  intending  by  it  to  ad- 
vance a  step  in  the  investigation  of  the  nature  of  music. 
For  the  mission  of  music  is  not  merely  to  be  a  quietus 
and  lullaby  to  the  soul  of  a  time  that  is  restless  with 
science.  This  it  does,  but  does  as  an  incident  of  far 
higher  work. 

On  an  earlier  page,  the  reader's  attention  was  recalled 
to  three  classes  of  activities  by  which  a  man  relates  him- 
self to  that  part  of  the  universe  which  is  not  himself,  — 
namely,  the  cognitive  (or  "  intellectual,"  as  I  have  used 
the  term  here,~~not  to  be  too  technical  for  the  general 
reader),  the  emotional,  and  the  physical.  Now,  man 
strives  always  to  place  himself  in  relation  not  only  with 
those  definite  forms  which  go  to  make  up  the  finite  world 
about  him,  but  also  with  that  indefinite  Something  up  to 
which  every  process  of  reasoning,  every  outgo  of  emo- 
tion, every  physical  activity,  inevitably  leads  him,  —  God, 
the  Infinite,  the  Unknown.  The  desire  of  man  is  tfiar 
he  may  relate  himself  with  the  Infinite  both  in  the  cog- 
nitive and  in  the  emotional  way.  Sir  William  Hamilton 
showed  clearly  how  impossible  was  any  full  relation  of 
the  former  sort,  in  showing  that  cognition  itself  was  a 
conditioning  (/.  <?.,  a  defining,  a  placing  of  boundaries 
appreciable  by  the  intellect),  and  that  therefore  the 
knowing  of  the  Infinite  was  the  conditioning  of  the  Un- 
conditioned, —  in  short,  impossible.  This  seemed  to 
preclude  the  possibility  of  any  relation  from  man  to 
God  of  the  cognitive  sort;  but  Mr.  Herbert  Spencer 
has  relieved  the  blankness  of  this  situation  by  asserting 
the  possibility  of  a   partial   relation   still.     Wc   cannot 

2 


1 8  Music  and   Poetry 

think  God,  it  is  true ;  but  we  can  think  towards  Him. 
This  in  point  of  fact  is  what  men  continually  do.  The 
definition  in  the  catechism,  "  God  is  a  spirit,  infinite, 
eternal,  and  unchangeable  in  His  being,  wisdom,"  etc, 
is  an  effort  of  man  to  relate  himself  to  God  in  the  cog- 
nitive, or  intellectual,  way :  it  is  a  thinking  towards 
God. 

Now,  there  is  a  constant  endeavor  of  man,  but  one  to 
which  less  attention  has  been  paid  by  philosophers,  to 
relate  himself  with  the  Infinite  not  only  in  the  cognitive 
way  just  described,  but  also  in  the  emotional  way.  Just 
as  persistently  as  our  thought  seeks  the  Infinite,  does 
our  emotion  seek  the  Infinite.  We  not  only  wish  to 
think  it,  we  wish  to  love  it ;  and  as  our  love  is  not  sub- 
ject to  the  disabilities  of  our  thought,  the  latter  of  these 
two  wishes  would  seem  to  be  capable  of  a  more  complete 
fulfilment  than  the  former.  It  has  been  shown  that  we 
can  only  think  towards  the  Infinite  ;  it  may  be  that  our 
love  can  reach  nearer  its  Object. 

As  a  philosophic  truth,  music  does  carry  our  emotion 
towards  the  Infinite.  No  man  will  doubt  this  who  re- 
flects for  a  moment  on  the  rise  of  music  in  the  Church. 
The  progress  of  this  remarkable  phenomenon  will  have 
probably  come,  in  some  way,  under  the  notice  ot  the 
youngest  person  who  will  read  this  paper. 

I  remember  when  the  most  flourishing  church  of  our 
town  regarded  with  intense  horror  a  proposition  to  buy 
an  organ,  considering  it  an  insidious  project  of  the  devil 
to  undermine  religion.  The  same  church  has  now  the 
largest  organ  in  the  city,  with  a  paid  organist  and  choir. 
Scarcely  any  person  who  has  lived  in  the  smaller  towns 
of  the  United  States  but  will  recall  similar  instances.  At 
present  the  organ,  the    song,   are    in    all   the   growing 


From   Bacon  to  Beethoven  19 

churches.     What  would  be  Mr.  IMoody  without  Mr.  San- 
key,  or  Mr.  Whittle  without  Mr.  Bliss? 

And  not  only  does  music  win  its  way  into  the  Church, 
but  it  gradually  takes  on  more  and  more  importance  in 
the  service  of  worship.  How  many  are  there  in  these 
days  to  whom  the  finest  preaching  comes  from  the  organ- 
loft  !  Greater  and  greater  every  year  grow  the  multi- 
tudes of  those  who  declare  that  no  sermons,  no  words, 
no  forms  of  any  sort,  avail  to  carry  them  on  the  way 
towards  the  desired  sacred  goal  as  do  the  tones  of  Pales- 
trina,  of  Bach,  of  Beethoven,  when  these  are  given  forth 
by  any  organist  of  even  moderate  accomplishment. 
Everywhere  one  finds  increasing  the  number  of  fen^ent 
souls  who  fare  easily  by  this  road  to  the  Lord.  From 
the  negro  swaying  to  and  fro  with  the  weird  rhythms  of 
"Swing  Low,  Sweet  Chariot,"  from  the  Georgia  Cracker 
yelling  the  "  Old  Ship  of  Zion  "  to  the  heavens  through 
the  logs  of  the  piney-woods  church,  to  the  intense  de- 
votee rapt  away  into  the  Infinite  upon  a  Mass  of  Pales- 
trina,  there  comes  but  one  testimony  to  the  substantial 
efficacy  of  music  in  this  matter  of  helping  the  emotion 
of  man  across  the  immensity  of  the  known  into  the 
boundaries  of  the  Unknown.  Nay,  there  are  those  who 
go  further  than  this  :  there  are  those  who  declare  that 
music  is  to  be  the  Church  of  the  future,  wherein  all 
creeds  will  unite  like  the  tones  in  a  chord. 

Now,  it  cannot  be  that  music  has  taken  this  place  in 
the  deepest  and  holiest  matters  of  man's  life  through 
mere  fortuitous  arrangement.  It  must  be  that  there 
exists  some  sort  of  relation  between  pure  tones  and  the 
spirit  of  man  by  virtue  of  which  the  latter  is  stimulated 
and  forced  onward  towards  the  great  End  of  all  love  and 
aspiration.     What  may  be  the  nature  of  this  relation,  — 


20  Music  and  Poetry- 

why  it  is  that  certain  vibrations  sent  forward  by  the  tym- 
panum along  the  bones  and  fluids  of  the  inner  ear  should 
at  length  arrive  at  the  spirit  of  man  endowed  with  such 
a  prodigious  and  heavenly  energy,  —  at  what  point  of 
the  course  they  acquire  this  capacity  of  angels,  being,  up 
to  that  point,  mere  particles  trembling  hither  and  thither, 
—  these  are,  in  the  present  state  of  our  knowledge,  mys- 
teries which  no  man  can  unravel. 

It  is  through  this  relation  of  music  to  man  that  it 
becomes,  as  I  said  in  the  principles  affirmed  at  the 
outset,  a  moral  agent.  Let  us  not  pester  ourselves  with 
remembering  how  such  and  such  a  musician  was  a  pro- 
fligate, a  beast,  a  trifler,  and  so  on.  This  is  only  sub- 
mitting ourselves  to  what  our  wise  Emerson  calls  the 
tyranny  of  particulars.  The  clear  judgment  in  the 
matter  is  to  be  formed  by  looking  at  the  consummate 
masters  of  the  art. 

Palestrina,  Bach,  Beethoven  —  what  had  these  gentle- 
men to  do  with  sheriffs  and  police,  with  penalties  and 
legal  sanctions?  They  were  law-abiding  citizens;  but 
their  adherence  to  the  law  was  the  outcome  of  an  inner 
desire  after  the  beauty  of  Order,  not  from  fear  of  the 
law's  punitive  power. 

In  short,  they  were  artists,  and  they  loved  goodness 
because  goodness  is  beautiful.  Badness  was  not  a  temp- 
tation, because  it  is  ugly,  and  the  true  artist  recoils  ener- 
getically from  ugliness. 

I  know  very  well  how  many  names  there  are  in  art 
which  are  associated  with  profligacy.  But  I  think  it 
clearly  demonstrable  that  in  all  these  artists  there  was  a 
failure  in  the  artistic  sense  precisely  to  the  extent  of  the 
failure  in  apprehending  those  enormous  laws  of  nature 
whose    practical    execution    by   the    individual    we    call 


From  Bacon  to  Beethoven  21 

morality.     You  can  always  see  where  the  half-way  good 
man  was  but  the  half-way  artist. 

One  hears  all  about  the  world  nowadays  that  art  is 
wholly  un-moral,  that  art  is  for  art's  sake,  that  art  has 
nothing  to  do  with  good  or  bad  in  behavior.  These  are 
the  cries  of  clever  men  whose  cleverness  can  imitate 
genius  so  aptly  as  to  persuade  many  that  they  have 
genius,  and  whose  smartness  can  preach  so  incisively 
about  art  that  many  believe  them  to  be  artists.  But 
such  catch-words  will  never  deceive  the  genius,  the  true 
artist.  The  true  artist  will  never  remain  a  bad  man ; 
he  will  always  wonder  at  a  wicked  artist.  The  simplic- 
ity of  this  wonder  renders  it  wholly  impregnable.  The 
argument  of  it  is  merely  this  :  the  artist  loves  beauty 
supremely ;  because  the  good  is  beautiful,  he  will  clamber 
continuously  towards  it,  through  all  possible  sloughs,  over 
all  possible  obstacles,  in  spite  of  all  possible  falls. 

This  is  the  artist's  creed.  Now,  just  as  music  increases 
in  hearty  acceptance  among  men,  so  will  this  true  artis- 
tic sense  of  the  loveliness  of  morality  spread,  so  will  the 
attractiveness  of  all  that  is  pure  and  lovely  grow  in  power, 
and  so  will  the  race  progress  towards  that  time  described 
in  the  beginning  of  this  essay  as  one  in  which  the  law 
would  cease  to  rely  upon  terror  for  its  sanction,  but  de- 
pend wholly  upon  love  and  desire. 

If  any  ask  whether  there  are  signs  of  such  a  beneficial 
spreading  of  music  among  the  general  classes  of  men, 
one  has  but  to  reply,  Look  around.  In  the  first  place, 
there  is  the  wond.rful  growth  of  music  in  the  churches, 
which  has  already  been  spoken  of.  But  that  is  only  half 
the  phenomenon.  Turn  from  the  churches  into  the 
homes  of  the  United  States.  It  is  often  asserted  that 
ours  is  a  materialistic  age,  and  that  romance  is  dead. 


22  Music  and   Poetry 

But  this  is  marvellously  untrue,  and  it  may  be  counter- 
asserted  with  perfect  confidence  that  there  was  never  an 
age  of  the  world  when  art  was  enthroned  by  so  many 
hearthstones  and  intimate  in  so  many  common  houses 
as  now.  For  the  pianos  are  almost  everywhere.  Where 
there  are  not  pianos,  there  are  cabinet-organs ;  and 
where  not  these,  the  guitars ;  not  to  speak  of  the  stray 
violins,  the  flutes,  the  horns,  the  clarinets,  which  lie 
about  in  houses  here  and  there  and  are  brought  out  on 
the  nights  when  the  sister  is  home  from  boarding-school 
or  when  the  village  orchestra  meets.  These  pianos  have 
done  a  great  work  for  music.  No  one  who  knows  the 
orchestra  well  can  admit  the  piano  for  itself  as  a  final 
good,  because  it  is  an  instrument  of  fixed  tones,  and 
therefore  imperfect ;  but  when  one  thinks  of  the  incal- 
culable service  which  the  piano  has  rendered  in  diffusing 
conceptions  of  harmony  (which  is  the  distinguishing 
characteristic  of  modern  music)  among  the  masses,  one 
must  regard  it  with  reverent  affection. 

Never  was  any  art  so  completely  a  household  art  as 
is  the  music  of  to-day;  and  the  piano  has  made  this 
possible. 

As  the  American  is,  with  all  his  shortcomings  of  other 
sorts,  at  any  rate  most  completely  the  man  of  to-day,  so 
it  is  directly  in  the  line  of  this  argument  to  say  that  one 
finds  more  "  talent  for  music "  among  the  Americans, 
especially  among  American  women,  than  among  any 
other  people.  The  musical  sense  is  very  widely  diffused 
among  us,  and  the  capacity  for  musical  execution  is 
strikingly  frequent. 

When  Americans  shall  have  learned  the  supreme  value 
and  glory  of  the  orchestra, — when  we  shall  have  ad- 
vanced beyond  the  piano,  which  is,  as  matters  now  exist, 


From  Bacon  to  Beethoven  23 

a  quite  necessary  stage  in  musical  growth,  —  when  our 
musical  young  women  shall  have  found  that,  if  their 
hands  are  too  small  for  the  piano,  or  if  they  have  no 
voices,  they  can  study  the  flute,  the  violin,  the  oboe,  the 
bassoon,  the  viola,  the  violoncello,  the  horn,  the  corno 
Inglese,  —  in  short,  every  orchestral  instrument,  —  and 
that  they  are  quite  as  capable  as  men  —  in  some  cases 
much  better  fitted  by  nature  than  any  man  —  to  play  all 
these,  then  I  look  to  see  America  the  home  of  the  or- 
chestra, and  to  hear  everywhere  the  profound  messages 
of  Beethoven  and  Bach  to  men. 

Meantime,  what  shall  we  say  of  an  art  which  thus  is 
becoming  so  much  the  daily  companion  of  man  as  to  sit 
by  every  fireside  and  in  every  church,  —  nay,  which,  I 
might  have  added,  thrusts  itself  into  the  crowded  streets 
in  a  thousand  shapes,  wherever  the  newsboy  whistles,  the 
running  clerk  hums  the  bass  he  is  to  sing  in  the  chorus, 
the  hand-organ  drones,  the  street-band  blares,  which 
presides  at  weddings,  at  feasts,  at  great  funerals,  which 
marches  at  the  head  of  batde,  and  opens  the  triumphant 
ceremonials  of  peace? 

As  for  Beethoven,  it  is  only  of  late  that  his  happy 
students  have  begun  to  conceive  the  true  height  and 
magnitude  of  his  nature.  The  educational  value  of  his 
works  upon  the  understanding  soul  which  has  yielded 
itself  to  the  rapture  of  their  teaching  is  unspeakable,  and 
is  of  a  sort  which  almost  compels  a  man  to  shed  tears  of 
gratitude  at  every  mention  of  this  master's  name.  For 
in  these  works  are  many  qualities  which  one  could  not 
expect  to  find  cohering  in  any  one  human  spirit.  Taking 
Beethoven's  sonatas  (which,  by  the  way,  no  one  will  ever 
properly  appreciate  until  he  regards  them  really  as  sym- 
phonies, and  mentally  distributes  the  parts  among  flutes, 


24  Music  and  Poetry 

reeds,  horns,  and  strings  as  he  goes  through  them),  his 
songs,  his  symphonies,  together,  I  know  not  where  one 
will  go  to  find  in  any  human  products  such  largeness, 
such  simplicity,  such  robust  manliness,  such  womanly 
tenderness,  such  variety  of  invention,  such  parsimony  of 
means  with  such  splendor  of  effects,  such  royal  grandeur 
without  pretence,  such  pomp  with  such  modesty,  such 
unfailing  moderation  and  exquisite  right  feeling  in  art, 
such  prodigious  transformations  and  re-transformations 
of  the  same  melody,  —  as  if  the  blue  sky  should  alter- 
nately shrink  into  a  blue  violet  and  then  expand  into 
a  sky  again,  —  such  love-making  to  the  infinite  and  the 
finite,  such  range  of  susceptibility,  such  many-sidedness 
in  offering  some  gift  to  every  nature  and  every  need, 
such  comprehension  of  the  whole  of  human  life. 

There  is  but  one  name  to  which  one  can  refer  in 
speaking  of  Beethoven :  it  is  Shakspere. 

For  as  Shakspere  is,  so  far,  our  king  of  conventional 
tones,  so  is  Beethoven  our  king  of  unconventional  tones. 
And  as  music  takes  up  the  thread  which  language  drops, 
so  it  is  where  Shakspere  ends  that  Beethoven  begins. 


II 

The  Orchestra  of  To-day 

Not  long  ago,  a  flute  was  found  near  Poictiers,  in 
France,  among  surroundings  wliich  pointed  to  the  age 
of  pre-historic  man  as  the  epoch  of  its  construction.  It 
lay  among  the  implements  of  the  stone  age,  and  was 
merely  a  piece  of  stag's-horn  pierced  with  three  holes, 
which  gave  it  a  capacity  of  four  tones,  without  counting 
possible  harmonics.  The  utmost  discoursing  of  this 
rude  instrument  must  have  been  but  trifling  compared 
with  the  weighty  message  of  its  silence,  as  it  lay  there 
among  its  uncouth  axes  and  knives ;  for  it  told  the 
strange  story  of  instrumental  melody  backward  to  a 
point  beyond  history,  and  hinted  that  man  commenced 
to  hunger  for  music  about  the  same  time  as  for  bread. 
But  along  with  this  antiquity  of  orchestral  constituents, 
the  thoughtful  musician  finds  the  seemingly  incongruous 
fact  that  what  we  call  the  orchestra  is  tlie  product  of 
only  the  last  two  centuries.  How  is  it  that  melody  is 
so  old,  and  harmony  so  young? 

The  answer  to  this  question  involves  considerations 
extending  to  the  very  deepest  springs  of  modern  life, 
and  leads  the  investigator  into  directions  little  suspected 
at  the  outset.  It  would  require  far  too  much  space  to 
be  attempted  here  ;  but  before  proceeding  to  set  forth 
—  as  the  main  body  of  this  paper  is  intended  to  do  — 
a  plain  and  untechnical  account,  for  non-musical  readers. 

25 


26  Music  and  Poetry 

of  the  nature  of  orchestral  instruments  and  the  work  of 
their  players,  I  wish  at  least  to  state  the  problem  clearly 
and  to  call  the  reader's  attention  to  some  circumstances 
which  look  toward  its  solution  ;  hoping  thus  to  present 
a  nucleus  about  which  the  scattered  items  of  fact  to  be 
subsequently  conveyed  may  group  themselves  into  port- 
able form. 

Consider,  for  example,  how  persistently  the  human 
imagination,  whenever  it  turned  at  all  in  the  direction  of 
music,  for  long  ages  addressed  itself  to  gigantic  specu- 
lations upon  the  power  of  it,  rather  than  to  the  more 
satisfactory  business  of  expressing  itself  immediately  in 
terms  of  the  musical  art.  Instead  of  making  music,  it 
made  a  great  ado  about  music.  Hence  we  have  (prac- 
tically) no  remains  of  ancient  music  ;  but  what  a  lot  of 
fablings,  often  beautiful  and  noble,  upon  it !  Compare 
for  a  moment  a  whole  mythology  of  these  with  the  fruits 
which  the  modern  mind  brings  out  of  the  same  realm  : 
the  results  are  striking  enough.  From  the  modern 
musical  imagination  we  get,  not  fables  about  melody, 
but  melodies;  not  unearthly  speculations  upon  music, 
but  actual  unearthly  harmonies ;  not  a  god  playing  a 
flute,  but  the  orchestra. 

Why  has  this  immense  development  of  music  occurred 
in  our  particular  modern  age,  rather  than  in  some  other? 

It  is  already  commonplace  to  say  that  what  we  call 
the  modern  epoch  is  contra-distinguished  from  all  others 
by  the  two  characteristic  signs  of  the  rise  of  music  and 
the  rise  of  science.  This  contemporaneity  of  develop- 
ment cannot  be  a  merely  accidental  coincidence.  That 
same  scientific  spirit  of  which  the  modern  time  has  wit- 
nessed such  an  influx  that  one  may  not  irreverently  term 
it  Pentecostal,  is  the  stimulus  which,  acting  in  one  direc- 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  27 

tion,  has  produced  the  body  of  modem  music,  in  an- 
other direction  the  body  of  modern  science.  For,  if 
the  scientific  spirit  be  but  a  passionate  longing  to  put 
oneself  in  relation  with  the  substance  of  things  —  with 
the  truth  as  it  actually  exists  outside  of  oneself,  —  then  it 
is  easily  conceivable  that  such  a  longing  might  influence 
very  powerfully  both  of  those  two  great  classes  of  man's 
spiritual  activities  which  we  are  accustomed  to  call,  the 
one  intellectual,  the  other  emotional ;  and  that,  driven 
by  such  a  longing,  intellectual  activity  might  result  in 
science,  emotional,  in  music. 

We  all  know  how  invariably,  from  of  old,  every  attempt 
to  draw  near  to  the  substance  of  things  has  ended  in 
quickly  bringing  the  investigator  to  the  same  awful  term, 
to  wit  —  God,  though  the  investigator  has  often  named 
it  far  otherwise.  And  —  if  such  be  the  real  outcome  of 
science  —  can  any  one  attend,  on  the  other  hand,  to  an 
intelligent  rendition  of  the  Fifth  Symphony  without 
finding  beneath  all  its  surface-ideas  this  same  powerful 
current  of  Desire  which  sets  the  soul  insensibly  closer 
toward  the  Unknown  by  methods  which  are  inarticu- 
late and  vague,  as  those  of  science  are  articulate  and 
precise  ? 

Moreover,  when  looked  at  from  the  standpoint  of 
any  large  classification  of  eras,  we  find  the  musicians 
and  the  scientists  about  shoulder  to  shoulder  in  time  ; 
we  find  Copernicus,  Galileo,  Newton,  Descartes,  De 
Maillet,  Haller,  Hunter,  Harvey,  Swedenborg,  Vesalius, 
Linnceus,  Lamarck,  Cuvier,  Buffon,  Franklin,  Hutton, 
Lycll,  Audubon,  Faraday,  Helmholtz,  Agnssiz,  Le  Conte, 
Huxley,  Tyndnll,  Darwin,  to  be  substantially  contempo- 
raries of  Palestrina,  Purcell,  the  Scarlattis,  Handel.  Bach, 
Gluck,  Haydn,  Mozart,  Beethoven,  Cherubini,  Schubert, 


2  8  Music  and  Poetry 

Von   Wcbcr,    Mendelssohn,    Spontini,    Spohr,    Rossini, 
Berlioz,    Schumann,    Chopin,    Glinka,    Gade,    Kuhlau, 
Boieldieu,  Rubinstein,  Raff,  Gounod,  Hamerik,  Wagner. 
In  truth  —  and  with  this  suggestion  one  can  now  come 
to  the  more  immediate  purpose  of  this  writing  —  per- 
haps it  will  finally  come  to  be  seen  that  if  we  shred  away 
from  music  and  science  all  that  manifold  husk  of  tempo- 
rary and  non-intrinsic  matters  which  envelops  the  nut  of 
every  important  movement,  we  will  find  both  presenting 
themselves  as  substantially  the  forms  in  which  the  de- 
voutness  of  our  age  has  expressed  itself —  that  devout- 
ness  without  which  no  age  is,  and  which  comes  down 
from  one  to  another  in  imperishable  yet  often  scarcely 
recognizable  shapes  ;   insomuch  that  our  great  men  are 
as  it  were  but  more  sensible  re-appearances  of  monks  — 
our  musicians  having  retired  for  worship  into  music,  as 
into  a  forest,  and  our  scientific  men  sending  out  the 
voice  of  uncontrollable  devotion  from  a  theory,  as  from 
a  Thebaid  cave. 

The  instruments  of  which  a  full  orchestra  is  composed 
are  of  three  general  classes:  "the  wind,"  "the  strings," 
and  the  "  instruments  of  percussion." 

To  begin  some  account  of  the  first-named  class :  per- 
haps nothing  is  more  perplexing  to  one  unfomiliar  with 
orchestras  than  the  goings-on  and  general  appearance 
of  the  wind-side  of  it ;  the  shapes  of  the  instruments 
seem  grotesque,  and  the  arrangement  of  the  keys  on  a 
Boehm  flute  (for  example)  or  a  bassoon  seems  utterly 
lawless  and  bewildering.  But  perhaps  by  reducing  all 
wind-instruments  to  one  common  type  and  then  clearly 
setting  forth  the  precise  manner  in  which  air,  when  set 
in  musical  vibration  by  the  human  breath  or  otherwise, 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  29 

is  definitely  controlled  to  this  or  that  pitch,  much  of 
the  embarrassment  of  this  apparent  complexity  can  be 
avoided. 

Let  this  common  type,  then,  be  a  straight  tube  of 
wood,  closed  at  one  end,  say  two  feet  in  length  and  an 
inch  in  diameter,  pierced  with  a  hole  at  the  distance  of 
an  inch  from  the  closed  end,  after  the  manner  of  a  flute 
embouchure.  Let  the  lips  now  be  applied  to  this  em- 
bouchure, and  a  stream  of  air  constantly  increasing  in 
force  be  sent  across  it.  The  first  tone  heard  will  be  the 
lowest  tone  of  which  the  tube  is  capable  ;  from  a  tube 
of  the  dimensions  named,  this  lowest  tone  will  not  be  a 
great  way  from  the  middle  C  of  the  pianoforte,  and  we 
will  here  assume  it  to  be  exactly  that  C.  Now,  most 
persons  who  have  not  reasoned  upon  the  subject  are 
found  to  expect  that  as  the  breath  increases  in  force  a 
series  of  tones  corresponding  to  the  ascending  scale 
from  C  will  be  produced.  But  this  is  far  from  being 
the  case  ;  on  the  contrary,  the  tone  first  produced  will 
grow  louder  and  louder,  until  suddenly  its  octave  will 
sound,  and  no  management  of  the  breath  can  by  any 
possibility  bring  out  an  intermediate  tone  between  this 
normal  C  and  its  octave.  If  the  force  of  the  breath  be 
still  increased,  presently  the  g  above  this  octave  will  be 
heard;  if  still  increased,  the  c  above  this  g;  still  in- 
creased, the  e  above  this  last  c ;  and  so  on,  in  a  series 
which  I  will  not  here  further  detail.  This  process  is 
typical  for  all  tubes,  of  whatever  size  or  material,  and 
however  the  air  may  be  agitated  in  them.  Its  explana- 
tion forms  one  of  the  most  striking  triumphs  of  modern 
science,  but  is  too  long  to  be  given  here. 

It  appears,  then,  that  our  tube  gives  us  already  five 
tones,  without  any  appliances  whatever  except  the  simple 


30  Music  and   Poetry- 

expedient  of  increasing  the  force  of  the  breath.  Suppose, 
now,  that  we  shorten  it  by  cutting  off  about  an  inch  ;  on 
applying  the  breath  gently  at  the  embouchure,  the  first 
tone  heard  will  now  be  D  (the  next  tone  in  the  scale  to 
the  C  first  mentioned)  ;  and  if  we  continue  to  increase 
the  force  of  the  breath,  as  at  first,  a  series  of  tones  will 
be  heard  bearing  the  same  relation  to  D  as  the  first 
series  bore  to  C,  that  is,  the  d  octav'^e  of  D,  then  the  a 
above  this  </,  then  the  d  above  this  a,  then  the/  sharp 
above  this  d,  and  so  on.  If  we  should  again  shorten  the 
tube  by  about  an  inch,  then  the  first  tone  heard  will  be 
E,  or  the  second  tone  in  the  scale  above  the  first  C  of 
the  long  tube ;  and,  again  forcing  the  breath,  another 
series  exactly  similar  to  the  last  will  be  produced.  It 
would  thus  seem  that  in  order  to  produce  those  interme- 
diate tones  of  the  scale  needed  to  fill  up  the  gap  between 
the  first  C  and  the  octave  of  it,  we  are  under  the  neces- 
sity of  shortening  the  tube  inch  by  inch.  And  so  we 
are,  but  there'  is  a  method  of  shortening  the  tube  which 
does  not  involve  cutting  it  off.  Piercing  it  with  a  hole 
of  from  an  eighth  to  a  quarter  of  an  inch  in  diameter  is 
found  to  have  the  same  effect  as  if  the  tube  were  cut  off 
at  the  point  where  the  hole  is  pierced,  and  this  discovery 
affonls  an  easy  method  of  producing  on  one  tube  all  the 
notes  belonging  to  the  gap  between  the  two  extremes  of 
the  first  octave  ;  for,  instead  of  shortening  the  tube  by 
cutting  it  off,  we  successively  shorten  it  by  piercing  holes 
at  the  points  where  it  ought  to  be  shortened.  If  we 
cover  all  these  holes  with  the  fingers,  the  tube  is  practi- 
cally two  feet  long,  and  will  give,  on  being  blown,  the  C 
first  mentioned ;  if  we  then  open  the  hole  farthest  from 
the  embouchure  by  lifting  up  the  finger  which  covers  it, 
the  tube  becomes  practically  shortened  by  an  inch,  and 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  31 

gives  us  the  next  tone  in  the  scale,  D,  which  we  can  then 
vary  with  all  the  hitherto  enumerated  changes  which  it 
undergoes  by  merely  increasing  the  force  of  the  breath. 
If  we  lift  up  the  next  finger,  we  again  practically  shorten 
the  tube  by  an  inch  and  get  the  next  tone  of  the  scale, 
E,  together  with  its  upper  tones,  or  harmonics.  It  will 
be  observed  that  in  obtaining  these  first  seven  tones 
from  the  normal  C  to  its  octave,  we  have  really  obtained 
an  instrument  capable  of  thirty-five  tones,  for  each  of 
the  first  seven  represents  not  only  itself  but  the  four  har- 
monics producible  by  merely  forcing  the  breath  upon  it 
without  changing  the  position  of  the  fingers.  In  prac- 
tice, some  of  the  higher  tones  of  these  harmonic  series 
are  found  not  to  be  available  —  for  reasons  too  abstruse 
to  be  mentioned  here  ;  but  the  lower  ones  are,  and  it 
is  upon  a  combination  of  the  principle  which  they  in- 
volve with  the  principle  of  shortening  the  tube  to  make 
the  first  octave,  that  all  wind  instruments  are  con- 
structed. In  the  case  of  the  trombone,  one  sees  the 
performer  actually  shortening  and  lengthening  the  nor- 
mal tube,  which  is  in  two  parts,  one  sliding  into  and  out 
of  the  other  like  a  telescope-joint.  In  the  other  brass 
instruments  the  long  normal  tube  is  bent  into  several 
crooks  which  can  be  thrown  into  one  tube  or  successively 
shut  off  to  diminish  the  aggregate  length,  by  means  of 
the  pistons  or  valves  which  the  performer  works  with  his 
finger. 

By  remembering,  therefore,  these  three  things  :  that 
the  shortening  of  a  tube  heiglitens  the  pitch  of  its  tone ; 
that  a  tube  may  be  shortened  either  by  holes  in  the  side 
(as  in  the  flutes,  the  oboes,  the  clarionets,  the  bassoons), 
or  by  shutting  off  some  of  its  crooks  (as  in  the  horns,  the 
trumpets,  and  the  like),  or  by  directly  contracting  its 


r 


32  Music  and  Poetry 

length  (ns  in  the  trombones)  ;  and  that  each  of  the 
tones  of  the  lowest  (or  first)  octave  produces  from  two 
to  five  other  tones  by  simply  blowing  it  more  strongly, 
the  reader  will  understand  the  principle,  varying  only 
in  details,  which  underlies  the  whole  wind-side  of  the 
orchestra. 

The  two  largest  classifications  of  the  wind-instruments 
are  called  among  players  "  the  wooden  wind  "  and  "  the 
brass."  The  first  of  these  is  further  subdivided  into  the 
reeds  and  the  flutes.  And  first  of  the  reeds,  about  which 
I  find  the  haziest  ideas  prevailing,  even  among  the  old- 
est frequenters  of  orchestral  performances. 

The  reed-instruments  in  common  use  are  the  oboes 
(or  hautboys),  the  bassoons,  and  the  clarionets. 

The  oboe  is  an  instrument  somewhat  like  the  familir. 
clarionet  in  appearance,  but  of  a  slenderer  make,  and 
differing  entirely  at  the  mouth-piece.  This  is  composed 
of  two  delicate  pieces  of  reed,  shaven  quite  thin,  in 
shape  much  like  the  blade  of  an  oar,  and  bound  face  to 
face.  These  pieces  are  attached  to  a  quill  which  is  in- 
serted in  the  small  end  of  the  oboe  tube.  The  mouth- 
pieces are  usually  kept  separate  from  the  tube  ;  when 
the  performer  is  about  to  play,  he  opens  a  small  box  in 
which  they  are  protected  from  exposure,  and  proceeds 
to  select  one  by  sucking  each  through  the  quill.  That 
one  which  first  responds  with  a  squeak  is  chosen ;  the 
quill  is  inserted  in  the  tube,  and  the  mouth-piece  is 
placed  between  the  lips,  the  under-lip  being  sHghtly 
drawn  in.  Much  practice  is  required  to  become  accus- 
tomed to  the  tickling  of  the  lips  produced  by  the  flutter- 
ing of  the  thin  reeds  as  the  breath  is  forced  over  them. 
The  tone  of  the  oboe,  though  intolerably  nasal  and  harsh 
when  produced  by  an  unskilful  player,  becomes  exqui- 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  2;^ 

sitely  liquid  and  engaging  if  the  performer  be  skillful.  It 
is  peculiarly  simple,  child -like  and  honest  in  quality,  and 
orchestral  composers  delight  to  use  it  for  expressing 
ideas  of  spring-time,  of  green  leaves,  of  sweet  rural  life, 
of  all  those  guileless  associations  connected  with  the 
antique  oaten  pipe.  Those  who  have  been  so  fortunate 
as  to  hear  the  rendition  of  Berlioz's  "  Dream  of  an 
Artist"  will  remember  the  exquisite  passages  in  which 
the  oboes  represent  the  pipings  and  replyings  of  shep- 
herds to  each  other  from  neighboring  hills.  In  Schultz's 
concert-piece  called  "  Im  Freien  "  {"  In  the  Open 
Air  "),  the  two  oboes  lead  off  in  a  lovely  candid  open- 
ing which  seems  to  infuse  one's  soul  with  the  very  spirit 
of  young,  green  leaves,  and  of  liberal  spring  airs. 

The  bassoon  is  a  long  wooden  instrument  held  verti- 
cally in  front  of  the  player  and  running  down  along  his 
right  side.  From  the  wooden  portion  projects  a  small 
silver  tube,  bent  somewhat  like  the  spout  of  a  kettle, 
into  which  a  mouth-piece  similar  to  that  of  the  oboe 
is  inserted.  Both  the  bassoon  and  the  oboe  are  called 
double-reed  instruments,  in  distinction  from  the  clario- 
net, which  has  a  mouth-piece  constructed  of  a  single 
reed.  The  bassoon  has  at  least  two  very  distinct  quali- 
ties of  tone  ;  in  the  upper  and  lower  extremes  of  its 
register  it  is  weird  and  ghostly,  but  in  the  middle  por- 
tion warm  and  noble.  For  the  production  of  ghostly 
effects,  for  calling  up  those  vague  apprehensions  of  the 
night,  when  churchyards  yawn,  and  the  like,  it  is  much 
used  by  composers.  In  a  singular  passage  of  the 
"Artist's  Dream,"  hereinbefore  mentioned,  it  is  made 
the  interpreter  of  a  colossal,  grotesque,  and  inconsolably 
bitter  sorrow.  The  beauty  of  its  middle  register  seems 
not  to  have  been  much  employed ;  but  no  one  can  listen 

3 


34  Music  and  Poetry 

to  the  ravishing  bassoon-solo  in  the  slow  movement  of 
the  concerto  for  piano  and  orchestra  by  Chopin  which 
Madame  Schiller  and  Thomas  have  made  known  to 
northern  audiences,  without  perceiving  in  this  portion  of 
the  bassoon's  compass  a  very  remarkable  combination 
of  gravity  and  sensuous  richness  —  a  combination  much 
like  that  suggested  when  we  think  of  a  very  stately  young 
Spanish  lady,  high  in  blood  and  in  color,  and  grandly 
costumed.  This  instrument  usually  appears  on  the  or- 
chestral score  SiS  fagotto,  Italian  for  fagot,  so  called  from 
the  resemblance  of  its  lower  portion  to  such  a  fagot  as 
might  result  from  binding  two  stout  pieces  of  wood  to- 
gether with  a  metal  band. 

The  clarionet  is,  as  was  above  remarked,  a  single-reed 
instrument.  This  single  reed,  instead  of  playing  against 
another  reed  like  itself,  as  in  the  oboe  and  bassoon,  is 
simply  bound  alongside  of  the  bevelled  plug  which  closes 
the  small  end  of  the  clarionet-tube,  leaving  a  narrow  slit 
between  the  reed  and  the  plug.  The  player  usually  has 
three  clarionets  standing  at  his  side  :  two  of  these  are 
constructed  of  a  different  pitch  from  the  other  non- trans- 
posing instruments  of  the  orchestra,  so  that  the  same 
written  note  when  played  by  them  gives  a  wholly  differ- 
ent sound.  The  reasons  for,  and  details  of,  this  arrange- 
ment would  lead  this  paper  beyond  its  scope  ;  and  it 
will  suffice  to  add  that  these  three  clarionets  are  known 
as  the  C  clarionet,  the  A  clarionet,  and  the  B-flat  clario- 
net, being  so  called  from  the  tones  of  the  other  instru- 
ments with  which  the  C  of  each  variety  coincides. 
Thus,  if  you  sound  a  written  C  on  the  A  clarionet,  the 
resulting  tone  is  the  same  as  the  written  A  of  the  other 
instruments;  if  you  sound  a  written  C  on  the  B-flat 
clarionet,  the  resulting  tone  is  the  same  as  if  the  other 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  25 

instruments  had  played  a  written  B-flat,  and  so  on.  It 
is  proper  to  add  that  in  modern  times  clarionets  have 
been  made  in  other  keys  —  that  is,  have  been  made 
with  such  lengths  of  tubes  that  their  C's  would  respec- 
tively coincide  with  other  tones  in  the  first  octave  of  the 
other  instruments ;  but  the  three  above  named  are  those 
almost  universally  used  in  non-military  orchestras. 

Of  course,  the  proper  allowance  has  to  be  made  for 
this  peculiarity  of  the  clarionet's  construction  in  writing 
for  it.  The  player  always  finds  the  words  "  A  clario- 
net," or  "  B-flat  clarionet,"  at  the  head  of  his  part,  indi- 
cating which  one  of  his  instruments  he  is  to  use  ;  and 
the  composer  has  to  vary  the  key  accordingly,  all  the 
clarionets  except  the  C  clarionet  necessarily  playing  in  a 
different  key  from  the  other  instruments. 

I  have  spoken  of  this  peculiarity  of  the  clarionet  — 
although  unable  here  to  explain  or  detail  it — particu- 
larly for  the  purpose  of  making  intelligible  to  the  reader 
what  I  shall  presently  have  to  say  with  reference  to  the 
work  of  the  conductor  of  an  orchestra. 

The  tone  of  the  clarionet  will  be  easily  singled  out  by 
most  persons  from  among  the  mingling  voices  of  the 
orchestra,  by  its  penetrating  sweetness  in  the  highest 
part  of  its  register,  its  liquid-amber  quality  in  the  middle 
part,  and  its  reedy  but  pathetic  mellowness  in  the  lower 
part.  No  one  will  fail  to  be  struck  with  the  peculiarly 
feminine  character  of  its  higher  utterances. 

Besides  the  clarionets  already  named,  large  orchestras 
often  employ  the  bass-clarionet.  The  name  of  this  in- 
strument indicates  its  nature  ;  its  tube  is  longer  and 
largf.T  than  that  of  the  others,  and  yields  a  tone  much 
lower  in  pitch,  though  of  similar  quality. 

Having  thus  given  a  most  meagre  outline  of  the  reed- 


3 6  Music  and  Poetry- 

division  of  the  "wooden  wind,"  it  will  not  be  necessary 
to  say  much  of  tlie  other  division,  which  is  much  more 
familiar  —  the    flutes.     It   will    be    useful,    however,    to 
describe  the  Boehm    flute — the    modern    form  of   the 
old-fashioned    flute  —  inasmuch    as   many    persons    are 
unacquainted  with  this  most  happy  of  all  the  more  mod- 
ern improvements  made  in  orchestral  instruments.     For 
a  long  time  the  flute  was  a  black  beast  in  the  orchestra ; 
it  could  not  be  made  perfectly  in  tune  throughout  its 
entire  compass ;  insomuch  that  all  sorts  of  bad  stories 
(such  as  that  there  was  but  one  thing  in  the  world  worse 
than  a  flute,  to  wit :  two  flutes  —  and  the  like)  were  told 
of  it.     The   reason  of  this  inability  to   make   the  flute 
wholly  in  tune  was  this.     In  consequence  of  the  peculiar 
formation  of  the  hand,  the  fingers  would  be  unable  to 
adjust  themselves  to  the  holes  of  a  flute  if  those  holes 
were  (as  they  ought  to  be)  of  equal  size,  and   placed 
nearly  at  equal  distances.     To  remedy  this,  the  holes 
had  to  be  placed  at  unequal  distances,  and  the  errors 
in  tune  thus  produced  were   compensated  by  unequally 
changing  the  size  of  the  holes.     But  this  compensation 
was  in  the  first  place  not  thorough,  for  the  instrument 
was  still   out    of  tune;    it  was,   in    the    second    place, 
attended  with  the  serious  disadvantage  of  almost  abolish- 
ing the  whole  lower  octave  of  the  flute  from  orchestral 
resources,  since  that  octave  was  rendered  so  weak  as  to 
be,  one   may  say,  silly  in  tone ;  and,  in  the  third  place, 
the  equality  of  power  and  color  was  destroyed,  some 
tones  sounding  veiled  and  some  open,  some  rich  and 
some  thin,  and  so  on.     The  invention  which  relieved  the 
flute  from  all  this  odium  and  brought  it  to  the  rank  of  a 
true  solo  instrument  dates  from  about  the  last  quarter  of 
a  century,  and  has  been  claimed  both  by  Captain  Gor- 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  37 

don  and  by  Boehm.  The  latter,  at  any  rate,  succeeded 
in  giving  his  name  to  it,  having  manufectured  for  several 
years  the  instrument  now  universally  known  as  the 
Boehm  flute.  The  nature  of  this  invention  was  briefly 
as  follows.  Instead  of  stopping  the  holes  directly  with 
the  balls  of  the  fingers,  as  before,  all  the  holes  were 
closed  with  padded  keys;  and  handles  were  so  arranged 
to  these  keys  —  by  means  of  a  very  ingenious  mechan- 
ism of  hollow  shafts  which  allowed  other  shafts  to  pass 
through  and  to  play  inside  of  them  —  that  any  hole  on 
the  flute  was  brought  practically  in  reach  of  any  finger, 
the  fingers  pressing  upon  the  handles  instead  of  directly 
upon  the  holes.  It  now  became  possible  to  make  all 
the  holes  much  larger  than  the  ball  of  the  finger  could 
cover  directly  —  which  had  long  been  a  much-desired 
object,  the  large  holes  being  found  to  yield  a  much  more 
powerful  tone  —  and  to  place  the  holes  at  the  precise 
distances  from  each  other  demanded  by  the  mathemati- 
cal laws  of  vibration. 

The  first  form  of  the  new  instrument  received  addi- 
tional improvements  from  time  to  time,  and  the  result 
was  the  present  Boehm  flute  —  an  instrument  whose  true 
capacities,  especially  when  used  in  masses,  may  be  said 
to  be  as  yet  almost  unemployed  by  composers.  The 
lowest  octave  of  the  Boehm  flute,  when  sounded  by  a 
player  who  knows  how  to  avoid  the  disagreeable  cornet- 
tone  which  only  vulgar  ears  aflect,  is  of  the  most  precious 
character,  at  once  soft,  suggestive,  rich,  and  passionate. 
It  is  wholly  different  from  any  tone  attainable  from  any 
other  instrument,  and  when  sounded  in  unison  by  eight 
or  ten  players  is  capable  of  the  most  delicate  and  yet 
striking  shades  of  expression.  TIic  failure  of  orchestral 
composers  to  employ  it,  or,  indeed,  to  learn  of  it,  earlier. 


:jiiyj.*>o 


38  Music  and   Poetry 

is  easily  accounted  for.  Flute-soloists  have  rarely  been 
able  to  resist  the  fatal  facility  of  the  instrument,  and 
have  usually  addressed  themselves  to  winning  the  ap- 
plause of  concert  audiences  by  the  execution  of  those 
brilliant  but  utterly  trifling  and  inane  variations  which 
constitute  the  great  body  of  existing  solos  for  the  flute. 
These  variations  are  written  mainly  for  the  second  and 
third  octaves  of  the  instrument,  and  the  consequence  has 
been  an  utter  lack  of  cultivation  of  the  lower  octave  by 
solo-players,  and  a  necessarily  resulting  ignorance  of  its 
capacity  by  composers.  Not  only  the  solo-players,  in- 
deed, have  been  thus  led  away  from  the  lower  octave ; 
even  the  hack  orchestral  players  suffered  the  same  fate, 
for  the  reason  that  the  old  flute  had  practically  no  lower 
octave,  and  the  old  composers  wrote  entirely  in  the 
upper  two.  At  present  there  are  rarely  more  than  three 
flutes  even  in  the  largest  orchestras ;  but  this  writer  does 
not  hesitate  to  record  his  belief — even  at  the  risk  of 
exciting  the  eyebrows  of  many  steady-going  musicians  — 
that  the  time  is  not  far  distant  when  the  twenty  violins 
of  a  good  orchestra  will  be  balanced  by  twenty  flutes. 

And  in  view  of  the  question  which  would  probably  be 
asked  by  these  objectors,  to  wit :  Where  ivould  you  get 
the  players  for  such  a  mwiber  of  flutes  ?  —  I  may  with 
propriety  at  this  point  diverge  for  a  moment  from  the 
direct  course,  to  make  a  suggestion  to  my  countrywomen 
in  which  I  feel  a  fervent  interest.  With  the  exception 
of  the  double-bass  (violin)  and  the  heavier  brass,  — 
indeed  I  am  not  sure  that  these  exceptions  are  neces- 
sary, —  there  is  no  instrument  of  the  orchestra  which  a 
woman  cannot  play  successfully.  The  extent,  depth, 
and  variety  of  musical  capability  among  the  women  of  the 
United  States  are  continual  new  sources  of  astonishment 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  39 

and  pleasure  to  this  writer,  although  his  pursuits  are  not 
specially  of  a  nature  to  bring  them  before  his  attention. 
It  may  be  asserted  without  extravagance  that  there  is  no 
limit  to  the  possible  achievements  of  our  countrywomen 
in  this  behalf,  if  their  efforts  be  once  turned  in  the  right 
direction.  This  direction  is,  unquestionably,  the  orches- 
tra. All  the  world  has  learned  to  play  the  piano.  Let 
our  young  ladies  —  always  saving,  of  course,  those  who 
have  the  gift  for  the  special  instrument  —  leave  that  and 
address  themselves  to  the  violin,  the  flute,  the  oboe,  the 
harp,  the  clarionet,  the  bassoon,  the  kettledrum.  It  is 
more  than  possible  that  upon  some  of  these  instruments 
the  superior  daintiness  of  the  female  tissue  might  finally 
make  the  woman  a  more  successful  player  than  the  man. 
On  the  flute,  for  instance,  a  certain  combination  of 
delicacy  with  flexibility  in  the  lips  is  absolutely  necessary 
to  bring  fully  out  that  passionate  yet  velvety  tone  herein- 
before alluded  to ;  and  many  male  players,  of  all  requi- 
site qualifications  so  far  as  manual  execution  is  concerned, 
will  be  forever  debarred  from  attaining  it  by  reason  of 
their  intractable,  rough  lips,  which  will  give  nothing  but 
a  correspondingly  intractable,  rough  tone.  The  same, 
in  less  degree,  may  be  said  of  the  oboe  and  bassoon. 
Besides,  the  qualities  required  to  make  a  perfect  orches- 
tral player  are  far  more  often  found  in  women  than  in 
men  ;  for  these  qualities  are  patience,  fervor,  and  fidelity, 
combined  with  deftness  of  hand  and  quick  intuitiveness 
of  soul. 

To  put  the  matter  in  another  view :  no  one  at  all 
acquainted  with  this  subject  will  undervalue  the  benefits 
to  female  health  to  be  brought  about  by  the  systematic 
use  of  wind-instruments.  Out  of  personal  knowledge, 
the  writer  pleases  himself  often  with  picturing  how  many 


40  Music  and   Poetry 

consumptive  chests,  dismal  shoulders,  and  melancholy 
spines  would  disappear,  how  many  rosy  cheeks  would 
blossom,  how  many  erect  forms  delight  the  eyes  which 
mourn  over  their  drooping, — under  the  stimulus  of 
those  long,  equable,  and  generous  inspirations  and  ex- 
pirations which  the  execution  of  every  moderately  diffi- 
cult piece  on  a  wind-instrument  requires. 

But,  returning  to  the  main  course  :  it  is  proper  now  to 
speak  of  the  other  great  division  of  wind-instruments 
known    as  "the    brass."     This  usually   consists   of   the 
trombones,  the  trumpets,  and  the  horns,  with  perhaps  a 
cornet-i-pistons,  though  this  last  is  not  thought  by  musi- 
cians to  be  worthy  of  much  rank  in  other  than  brass 
bands   and    military  orchestras.     The    trombone    in   its 
older  form  is  probably  familiar  to  most  persons  as  the 
long  brass  instrument  which  the  performer  elongates  and 
shortens  alternately  by  sliding  it  out  and  in.     Its  tone  is 
gigantic,  jubilant,  and  vigorous.      The  trumpet  tone  is 
also  familiar  for  its  bold  and  manly  character,  or  for  the 
startling  and  crashing  breaks  which  it  sometimes  makes 
upon  the  softer  harmonies.     The  horn  is  the  instrument 
which  curls  upon  itself  in  a  circular  coil,  the  performer 
often  thrusting  his  unemployed  hand  into  its  large  bell 
to  assist  in  controlling  the  great  difficulties  of  pure  into- 
nation upon  this  instrument.     Its  tone  is  indescribably 
broad,  mellow,  and  noble,  and  is  capable  of  very  great 
variation   in  degrees   of  loudness.     Most    persons  who 
have  heard  Thomas's  orchestra  will  remember  the  lovely 
long-drawn  pianissimo  notes  of  this  instrument  which 
introduce  the  overture  to  "  Oberon,"  or  the  far-off  rav- 
ishment with  which  it  steals  upon  the  enormous  chord  of 
violin-tones  in  Asger  Hamerik's  "  First  Norse  Suite." 
Leaving  now  the  wind-side  of  the  orchestra,  let  us 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  41 

pass  over  to  "  the  strings."  This  term,  in  the  ordinary 
parlance  of  musicians,  is  understood  to  mean  the  four 
classes  of  the  viol-tribe,  namely,  the  violins,  tlie  violas, 
the  violoncellos,  and  the  contra-basses  or  double-basses. 
In  its  largest  application  it  would  of  course  include  the 
harps,  and  such  rarely  used  instruments  as  the  guitar 
and  the  viol  d'amour.  The  violin  is  too  familiar  to 
need  comment  in  so  cursory  a  paper  as  this.  The  viola 
is  an  instrument  almost  exactly  like  the  violin,  but  some- 
what larger,  and  four  tones  lower  in  pitch.  It  has  not 
the  brittleness,  the  crispness,  nor  the  brilliance  of  the 
violin ;  but  is  distinguished  by  a  melancholy  and  pa- 
thetic tone  quite  peculiar  to  itself.  Those  who  have 
heard  the  "  Italy"  of  Berlioz  will  easily  recall  the  viola, 
which  is  the  hero  of  the  whole  piece.  It  is  matter 
of  regret  that  this  noble  instrument  has  now  so  few 
cultivators. 

The  violoncello  is  a  more  familiar  instrument  to  most 
persons  than  the  viola.  It  is  tuned  just  an  octave  lower 
than  that  instrument.  Since  the  time  of  Beethoven  it 
has  been  much  cultivated,  and  passages  are  now  freely 
written  for  it  which  would  have  made  the  older  players 
stare  and  stop  for  another  pinch  of  snuff.  Its  powers 
are  quite  varied ;  it  is  competent  for  a  serenade  or  a 
prayer ;  for  suggesting  mere  lazy  tropical  sensuousness 
or  manly  protests  against  wrong.  Perhaps  the  most 
remarkable  deliverance  intrusted  to  it  by  a  modern 
composer  occurs  in  the  "  Jewish  Trilogy  "  of  Ilamerik. 
Here,  after  a  lovely  harmonic  conception,  the  whole 
orchestra  ceases,  and  one  violoncello  begins  a  strange 
monody,  which  is  continued  for  a  long  time  :  a  monody 
as  of  a  prophet  standing  between  the  people  and  the 
altar  and  recounting  with  intense  passion  the  captivities, 


42  Music  and   Poetry 

the  escapes,  the  sins,  the  covenants,  the  blessings,  in 
truth,  the  whole  romantic  past,  of  the  Jews  —  the  entire 
effect  deriving  extraordinary  power  from  the  sense  of 
tenacity  due  to  the  peculiar  sustaining  power  of  this 
instrument,  and  from  the  sense  of  isolation  excited  by 
the  lonesomeness  of  its  voice  when  thus  lifted  up  in 
the  suddenly  silent  orchestra. 

The  double-basses  are  well  known  to  all  as  the  largest 
of  the  violin-tribe;  and  the  harps  are  also  familiar;  so 
that,  although  both  are  of  great  interest  to  the  musician, 
the  points  that  make  them  so  are  too  technical  for  men- 
tion in  this  place,  and  we  may  pass  on  now  to  a  word 
about  the  instruments  of  percussion.  Those  in  common 
use  are  the  commonly  called  bass-drum,  the  snare-drum 
(employed  by  ordinary  military  companies),  the  cym- 
bals, and  the  kettledrum.  This  latter,  of  which  there 
are  always  at  least  two  in  an  orchestra,  is  like  a 
large,  round-bottomed  brass  pot,  the  mouth  of  which  is 
covered  with  a  membrane  stretched  across.  Its  pitch 
is  varied  by  screws  which  tighten  the  membrane ;  the 
two  tones  to  which  the  two  drums  are  tuned  being 
usually  the  tonic  and  the  dominant  of  the  key  in  which 
the  orchestra  is  playing.  Those  who  remember  the 
lovely  little  "  Scandinavian  Wedding  March  "  by  Soder- 
man  will  recall  the  adroit  employment  of  the  kettledrum 
in  the  opening  to  intensify  the  mood  of  expectation 
upon  which  the  soft  harmonies  are  presently  to  fall. 

In  closing  this  rapid  account  of  the  orchestral  con- 
stituents, it  is  proper  to  mention  that  several  instru- 
ments whose  employment  is  more  or  less  unusual  have 
been  omitted ;  such  as  the  bass-flute  (sometimes  called 
the  alto-flute),  which  is  of  quite  recent  invention,  and 
bears  much  the  same  relation  to  the  ordinary  flute  as 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  43 

that  of  the  viola  to  the  vioHn ;  the  piccolo,  which  is 
a  very  short  small  flute,  set  an  octave  higher  than  the 
concert-flute,  and  which  is  in  nearly  every  orchestra  ; 
the  harmonicon,  the  small  harmonium,  the  corno  Inglese 
(a  large  cousin  of  the  oboe),  the  castanets,  various  sized 
cymbals,  the  zither,  and  others.  The  zither  has  been 
made  known  to  many  persons  by  the  pretty  tinkling 
air  it  plays  in  a  dream-piece  by  Lumbye,  which  one 
used  to  find  often  recurring  in  Theodore  Thomas's 
programmes. 

As  soon  as  the  members  of  the  orchestra  have  as- 
sembled, say  for  a  rehearsal,  the  first  business  is  to  bring 
all  the  instruments  to  the  same  pitch.  For  this  purpose 
the  oboe,  considered  to  be  the  least  variable  instrument, 
sounds  a  long  and  insistent  A,  with  which  each  player 
proceeds  to  make  his  A  (or  the  corresponding  tone 
if  he  has  a  transposing  instrument)  coincide.  The  con- 
ductor mounts  his  platform  and  raps  with  his  baton, 
holding  the  latter  poised  aloft  for  a  moment.  Each 
player  must  now  have  his  eyes  at  once  upon  the  con- 
ductor and  upon  the  written  part  before  himself,  —  a 
dual  attention  which  must  be  maintained  steadily 
throughout  the  composition,  and  which  requires  more 
concentration  than  one  is  at  first  inclined  to  appreciate. 
With  the  first  down-stroke  of  the  conductor's  baton  the 
first  bar  of  the  piece  commences.  Fancy,  for  example, 
that  you  are  first  flute-player,  and  that  the  figures  thirty- 
seven  occur  over  a  blank  space  of  the  stafi"  on  your  part. 
This  means  that  you  are  not  to  come  in  until  thirty- 
seven  bars  are  played  by  the  other  instruments ;  and 
you  are  now  to  carry  on  a  double  set  of  countings  in 
your  mind,  the  one  recording  the  beats  of  each  bar, 
the  other  recording  the   number  of  bars.     You  there- 


44  Music  and  Poetry 

fore  commence,  with  the  conductor's  first  down  beat, 
to  count  mentally,  keeping  a  tally  of  each  set  of  four 
beats ;  supposing  the  piece  is  in  four-four  time,  that 
is,  that  there  are  four  of  the  conductor's  beats  to  each 
bar,  you  say,  one  (two-three-four),  two  (two-three-four), 
three  (tvvo-three-four), /<?///-  (two-three-four), yfz;^  (two- 
tliree-four) ,  and  so  on.  About  the  time  you  have 
reached  thirty-one  (two-three-four),  you  will  infallibly  — 
if  an  inexperienced  player  —  fall  to  wondering  whether 
you  did  not  omit  to  say  thirty  (two-three-four),  and 
while  this  inward  debate  is  going  on,  you  have,  of 
course,  neglected  the  thirty-two  (two-three-four),  to 
remedy  which  you  jump  to  the  thirty-three,  but  in  so 
doing  reflect  that  you  were  probably  discussing  long 
enough  to  occupy  two  bars,  and  ought  to  have  jumped 
to  thirty-four,  or,  even  perhaps  thirty-five  —  by  which 
time  your  heart  is  thumping  with  anticipation  of  the 
conductor's  scowl,  when  you  shall  presently  come  in 
wrong  and  compel  him  to  stop  the  whole  orchestra  in 
order  to  commence  over  —  until  finally  you  are  in  a 
state  of  hopeless,  inane  confusion,  and  the  chances  are 
a  thousand  to  one  that  you  do  come  in  wrong,  with  all 
manner  of  vile  discord  and  resultant  trouble.  Of  course 
there  are  many  passages  which  are  easier,  by  reason  of 
one's  familiarity  with  the  composition.  A  certain  auto- 
matic precision  of  count  comes  with  long  experience. 

But  if  the  player's  part  is  by  no  means  the  trifling 
work  which  many  imagine,  the  conductor's  will  certainly 
impress  one  who  becomes  acquainted  with  it  for  the 
first  time  as  requiring  an  amount  of  mental  strain  little 
suspected  by  those  who  only  see  the  graceful  curves  of 
the  baton  and  the  silent  figure  that  moves  it.  The  con- 
ductor must   read    simultaneously  all  the   bars  written 


The  Orchestra  of  To-day  45 

for  each  class  of  the  instruments  in  his  orchestra,  the 
notes  being  written  under  each  other,  those  for  the 
piccolo  and  flutes  at  the  top,  those  for  the  double- 
basses  at  the  bottom,  the  rest  between.  But  this  large 
ccjUection  of  notes,  which  have  thus  to  be  instantane- 
ously read,  is  written  not  only  in  different  keys,  but 
with  different  clefs ;  the  horns  and  clarionets  may  each 
be  playing  in  different  keys  from  the  other  instruments ; 
the  tenor  trombones  will  be  playing  notes  written  upon 
a  still  different  system  ;  the  violoncellos,  notes  written 
upon  a  still  different  system;  the  double-basses  and 
bassoons  and  bass-trombones  and  drums,  notes  written 
upon  yet  another  system.  And  this  is  not  half;  for 
while  the  conductor's  eye  is  reading  these  notes  his  ear 
has  to  watch  over  each  one  of  his  sixty  to  a  hundred 
and  fifty  instruments,  and  instandy  report  the  least 
failure  of  one  to  play  exactly  what  is  written  ;  and  this 
is  not  nearly  all ;  for  besides,  the  conductor's  arm  must 
keep  up  the  unceasing  beats  of  time,  and  must  make 
the  different  expression-signs,  i.  <?.,  the  signals  for  loud 
or  soft,  or  slower  or  faster,  and  the  like.  Fancy,  in 
other  words,  that  you  had  a  class  in  elocution  of  sixty 
pupils,  all  of  whom  simultaneously  read  aloud  to  you  — 
some  in  Greek,  some  in  Hebrew,  some  in  French,  some 
in  Latin,  some  in  English  —  and  that  the  least  fault 
in  pronouncing  any  word  of  any  of  these  languages, 
or  the  least  error  even  in  inflection  or  intonation,  must 
be  detected.  This  is  a  fair  analogy  to  the  labor  of  the 
orchestral  conductor. 

In  the  judgment  of  the  writer,  although  the  improve- 
ments of  the  orchestra  have  been  very  great  in  modern 
times,  it  is  yet  in  its  infancy  as  an  adequate  exponent 
of  those  inward  desires  of  man  which  find   their  best 


46  Music  and  Poetry 

solace  in  music.  No  prudent  person  acquainted  with 
the  facts  will  now  dare  to  set  limits  to  the  future  ex- 
pressive powers  of  this  new  and  manifold  voice  which 
m  .n  has  found.  The  physics  of  music  have  made  such 
enormous  advances  under  the  scientific  labors  of  Helm- 
holtz,  Alfred  M.  Mayer,  and  others,  that  the  art  cannot 
but  receive  additional  aid  through  the  facts  thus  dis- 
covered, and  one  cannot  help  looking  to  see  new  in- 
struments before  long  which  will  indefinitely  increase 
the  resources  of  the  orchestra  of  the  future.  Many 
reasons  seem  to  justify  the  belief  that  the  home  of  the 
orchestra  is  to  be  in  this  country  :  meantime,  one  can 
frame  no  fairer  wish  for  one's  countrymen  than  that 
they  may  quickly  come  to  know  the  wise  expansions 
and  large  tolerances  and  heavenly  satisfactions  which 
stream  into  the  soul  of  him  that  hath  ears  to  hear, 
out  of  the  orchestra  of  the  present. 


The  Physics  of  Music  47 


III 

The  Physics  of  Music* 

Take  if  you  please  the  lowest  work  of  genius  and  the 
highest  work  of  talent :  the  former  is  always  Art,  the 
latter  always  mere  cleverness.  The  one  is  always  in 
some  sense  true  :  the  other  is  often  in  all  senses  false. 
In  truth,  there  is  that  in  the  very  nature  of  Cleverness 
which  renders  it  particularly  liable  to  mislead  either 
itself  or  other  people.  Confront  it  with  something  new 
that  is  to  be  taken  account  of :  it  has  not  that  indescrib- 
able insight  of  fervent  love  which  lies  at  the  bottom  of 
genius  ;  it  cannot  burn  away  the  husk  of  things  with  that 
instinct  towards  the  kernel  which  genius  possesses  ;  it  is 
busied,  like  a  newspaper  reporter,  more  with  thinking 
how  much  can  be  said  than  with  observing  the  facts  that 
should  be  said  ;  it  can  evolve  a  paragraph  easier  than 
record  a  circumstance.  Its  facile  dexterity  is  often  its 
ruin  —  as  if  a  hasty  spider  should  mesh  his  own  legs. 

Now  the  doctrine  oi  falsus  in  uno  is  not  true  except 
with  very  careful  limitations  ;  but  —  to  descend  to  par- 
ticulars —  if  a  man  can  be  shown  to  have  written  a  paper 
every  important  proposition  of  which  contains  inac- 
curacies, and  several  important  propositions  of  which  are 
preposterous,  then  it  would  seem  to  be  fair  at  least  to 
regard  with  suspicion  all  his  utterances  in  other  papers 
upon  the  same  general  subject. 

»  Written  in  1875. 


48  Music  and  Poetry 

The  object  of  this  present  writing  is,  downright,  to 
discredit  Mr.  Richard  Grant  White  as  authority  in  any 
matter  whatever  pertaining  to  music :  and  there  are 
grave  reasons  why  this  subject  is  a  praisevvortliy  one,  — 
one,  indeed,  so  far  removed  from  a  mere  flippant  dis- 
cussion that  it  is  thorouglily  in  the  nature  of  a  religious 
purpose.  For  every  fervent  and  pious  lover  of  art  must 
look  with  displeasure  upon  the  quarrel  into  which  Mr. 
White  has  been  urging  musicians  through  the  columns 
of  the  Galaxy  for  some  months,  actually  entrapping 
many  of  the  unwary.  The  descriptive  part  of  what  is 
called  "  descriptive  music "  has  no  arms,  nor  sheriff, 
nor  other  physical  sanction  of  law  :  not  the  least  atom 
of  obligation  rests  upon  any  human  being  to  go  by  the 
programme  of  what  is  called  "  programme  music  "  :  any 
soul  may  hear  the  music  and  draw  just  what  glories  of 
delight  or  of  sadness  from  it  that  his  own  whimsiest 
mood  may  suggest.  The  only  view  of  art  is  that  of 
"  liberal  applications,"  as  Wordsworth  happily  called 
them  :  that  which,  allowing  a  man  to  smile,  or  to  shed 
tears,  over  a  violet  (/.  e.,  Nature)  just  according  as  it 
breeds  in  him  a  happy  or  a  regretful  mood,  in  the  same 
way  allows  him  to  interpret  at  his  own  will  a  picture, 
a  tone-poem,  a  word-poem,  or  any  other  artistic  form. 
It  is  all  free  trade  in  Art :   there  are  no  duties. 

The  heart  of  man  is  big  enough  and  hungry  enough 
for  all  the  good  music  that  can  ever  be  written,  descrip- 
tive or  otherwise.  If  descriptive  music  is  a  mistake,  let 
it  be  :  the  mistake  usually  lies  in  the  description  only, 
not  in  the  music,  for  much  of  it  is  wonderfully  lovely ; 
shall  a  Protestant  reject  all  the  Madonna  pictures  be- 
cause he  rejects  the  theology  of  their  painters?  The 
solitary  question  to  ask  of  a  new  composition  is  —  not,  is 


The  Physics  of  Music  49 

it  descriptive,  but  is  it  beautiful  in  any,  the  largest, 
sense  of  that  term  ?  If  it  is,  why  then  in  God's  name  — 
spoken  with  reverence  —  let  us  hear  it,  and  hear  it  often. 

Mr.  White  has  recently  printed  in  the  Galaxy  maga- 
zine a  paper  entided  The  Science  and  the  Philoso- 
phy of  Music :  the  "Science"  in  this  title  meaning 
the  physical  science  of  acoustics  as  for  as  it  relates  to 
musical  sounds,  and  not  the  science  of  music,  proper, 
whose  existence  the  author  has  often  denied.  Of  this 
paper  about  the  first  four  and  a  half  pages  concern 
themselves  with  the  "  science,"  the  remainder  with  the 
"  philosophy,"  of  music.  The  former  is  the  part  to  be 
herein  spoken  of. 

It  is  subdivided  into  twelve  paragraphs,  containing 
more  or  less  distinct  propositions.  Now,  speaking  with 
scientific  accuracy,  there  is  not  one  of  these  paragraphs 
but  falls  within  the  following  categories,  to  wit :  the 
demonstrably  absurd,  the  wrong  in  statement,  the  wrong 
in  substance  :  and  some  belong  to  all  three  at  once.  It 
is  so  curiously  wrong  that  there  are  scarce  a  half  dozen 
sentences  which  do  not  contain  inaccuracies  :  and  these 
are  sentences  of  connection  rather  than  of  matter.  The 
whole  no  better  constitutes  a  view  of  the  Science  of 
Music  than  a  wrongly-wired  skeleton  constitutes  a  view 
of  the  science  of  anatomy.  It  is  the  very  climacteric 
and  crooked  top-piece  of  error. 

Of  course  such  assertions  as  these  are  both  trifling 
and  arrogant  unless  immediately  followed  up  by  detailed 
proofs.  In  the  course  of  what  is  hereinafter  said,  I  shall 
have  occasion  to  quote  nearly  the  whole  of  Mr.  While's 
paper  as  printed,  so  far  as  it  refers  to  the  science  of 
music. 

He  begins :  "  In  a  recent  article   I  had  occasion  to 

4 


50  Music  and  Poetry- 

show  that  the  commonly-used  phrase  *  scientific  music ' 
is  incorrect  and  misleading,  because  music  is  not  a 
science,  but  an  art  involving  neither  in  its  composition 
nor  its  performance  any  knowledge  whatever  of  any 
science,  either  musical  or  other." 

Each  of  the  three  clauses  of  this  sentence  is  absurdly 
erroneous.  A  science  is  a  body  of  facts,  classified  upon 
system,  and  generalized  into  laws.  These  laws  are  simply 
expressions  in  short  of  the  numbers  of  individual  and  sim- 
ilar facts.  The  law  of  gravity,  for  instance,  is  only  a  short 
summing  up  of  all  those  multitudinous  occasions  when 
men  have  observed  that  small  bodies  fall  towards  large 
ones.  There  is  a  science  of  music,  embodying  a  great 
number  of  classified  facts,  and  presenting  a  great  num- 
ber of  scientific  laws  which  are  as  thoroughly  recognized 
among  musicians  as  are  the  laws  of  any  other  sciences 
among  their  professors.  There  is  a  science  of  harmony, 
a  science  of  composition,  a  science  of  orchestration,  a 
science  of  performance  upon  stringed  instruments,  a  sci- 
ence of  performance  upon  wind  instruments,  a  science 
of  vocaUzation ;  not  a  branch  of  the  art  of  nmsic  but  has 
its  own  analogous  body  of  classified  facts  and  general 
laws.  Music  is  so  much  a  science  that  a  man  may  be 
a  thorough  musician  who  has  never  written  a  tune  and 
who  cannot  play  a  note  upon  any  instrument.  One 
asks  with  astonishment  if  it  be  possible  that  a  writer  in  an 
intelligendy-conducted  magazine  could  undertake  a  paper 
on  The  Science  and  The  Philosophy  of  Music,  who  was 
ignorant  of  that  great  body  of  literature  in  which  the 
science  of  thorough-bass,  the  science  of  orchestration, 
the  science  of  execution,  and  the  like,  are  formally  set 
forth?  But  the  case  is  worse  :  for  Mr.  White  himself,  a 
little  further  on,  employs  some  of  the  terms  and  recog- 


The  Physics  of  Music  51 

nizes  some  of  the  laws  of  the  Science  of  Thorough-bass. 
We  find  him  talking  of  the  tonic,  the  third,  the  fifth,  and 
incidentally  recognizing  the  law  that,  with  any  tone  of 
a  scale  as  tonic,  these  three  form  a  chord,  of  idiosyn- 
cratic properties  and  relations :  and  we  find  him  giving 
quotations  from  Mr.  Rice  which  bristle  thickly  with  the 
terminology  of  music. 

The  truth  is,  that  the  concluding  clause  of  Mr.  White's 
first  sentence  calls  for  flat  contradiction,  term  for  term  : 
and  that  music  is  an  art  which  does  involve  both  in  its 
composition  and  its  performance  a  precise  knowledge  of 
musical  science. 

"  It  is  nevertheless  true,  as  was  then  intimated,  that 
there  is  a  science  of  music,  a  very  exact  and  absolute 
science,  the  laws  of  which  control  the  vibration  of  every 
string  in  a  grand  orchestra,  and  to  which  every  chord 
struck  or  uttered  must  conform.  But  of  this  science 
there  were  probably  never  four  persons  more  ignorant 
than  Handel,  Haydn,  Mozart,  and  Beethoven.  This  I 
do  not  mean  to  assert  positively,  for  I  do  not  know  it  to 
be  true  :  but  I  know  of  no  fact  in  the  life  of  either  that 
points  to  a  knowledge  of  this  science,  which  would  not 
have  been  of  any  service  to  them  whether  as  composers 
or  performers.  This  science  is  not  that  of  acoustics, 
although  it  is  an  acoustic  science.  The  science  of 
acoustics  includes  the  science  of  music. 

"A  little  book  has  lately  been  published  which  may 
be  made  the  occasion  of  giving  an  idea  of  what  this 
science  of  music  is,  upon  which  depends  the  construc- 
tion of  every  musical  phrase,  the  performance  of  every 
musical  artist,  and  which  yet  is  of  no  more  service  to  a 
composer  or  to  a  singer  than  an  acquaintance  with 
chemistry  or  with  optics  would  be  to  a  painter." 


£2  Music  and  Poetry 

Now  without  stopping  to  chide  the  petty  ailificc  of 
language  by  wliich  Mr.  White  endeavors  to   make  the 
unsusi)ecting  reader  glow  with  wcnder  at  the  fact  that 
Handel,  Haydn,  Mozart,  Beethoven,  with  all  their  four- 
fold force,  could  not  break  through  the  physical  laws  of 
nature,  i.e.,  that  although  these  men  were  ignorant  of 
the  physical  laws  of  vibration,   yet  nevertheless   every 
fiddle-string  upon  which  their  compositions  were  played 
did  verily  and  in   the  strangest  manner  vibrate  always 
according  to  the  natural  laws  of  vibration ;  and  without 
doing  more  than  barely  pointing  out  how,  so  far  from  its 
being  true,  as  Mr.  White  declares,  that  the  construction 
of  every  musical  phrase  depends  on  the  physical  science 
of  music,  the  fact  is  that  the  construction  of  no  musical 
phrase  depends  in  the  least  degree  on  the  physics  of  music 
and  would  not  be  in  the  remotest  way  affected  if  every  law 
of  vibration  were  reversed  or  if  all  of  them  were  abol- 
ished :   let  us  confine  our  attention  to  the  last  clause  of 
this  last  extract,   and   inquire  if  Mr.  White  can  really 
conceive  a   painter   unacquainted    with   optics?     What 
kind  of  pictures  would  that  artist  paint  who  did  not 
have  literally  at  his  fingers'-ends  the  laws  of  perspective, 
the  laws  of  the  radiation  of  light  in  right  lines,  the  laws 
of  shadows,  the  laws  of  apparent  projection  upon  plane 
surfaces?     Or,  —  to  go  further  into  the  mere  curiosities 
of  error — will  Mr.  White  undertake  to  say,  in  view  of 
the  aniline  dyes  and  the  like,  that  a  painter  acquainted 
with  chemistry  might  not  discover  new  pigments  more 
brilliant,  more  various,  more    powerful,  than   any   now 
known,  and  that  it  would  not  be  "of  service  "  to  him? 
Nay,  —  leaving  these  merely  childish  ciii  bono  v\t\\%  — 
what  can  a  gentleman  of  Mr.  ^Vhite's  culture  mean  by 
this  strenuous  limitation  of  the  artist  to  ignorant  work, 


The  Physics  of  Music  53 

and  by  these  persevering  asseverations  that  the  artist, 
be  he  painter,  musician,  or  other,  would  be  no  whit  the 
better  for  an  intelhgent  understanding  of  those  won- 
derful and  beautiful  phenomena  which  occur  when  his 
dreams  take  physical  form  ?  Why,  but  to  know  them  is 
a  new  and  illimitable  inspiration  in  itself;  and  he  is  a 
bold  man  who  will  attempt,  at  this  particular  stage  of 
progressive  physics,  to  prescribe  the  boundaries  of  that 
flight  which  music  will  compass  when  musicians  shall 
have  learned  to  feather  the  arrow  of  their  art  with  the 
guidances  of  their  whole  science. 

"The  author  of  this  work,"  (proceeds  Mr.  White) 
"  Sedley  Taylor  (who,  however,  confesses  his  obligations 
to  Professor  Hclmholtz,  a  very  profound  investigator 
into  the  laws  of  acoustics),  tells  us  that  he  aims  at 
placing  before  persons  unacquainted  with  mathematics 
an  intelligible  and  succinct  account  of  that  part  of  the 
theory  of  sound  which  constitutes  the  physical  basis  of 
the  art  of  music." 

Than  the  last  seventeen  words  of  which,  nothing  could 
more  clearly  illustrate  that  employment  of  inexact  lan- 
guage which  results  in  absurdity.  How  can  a  theory 
(of  sound,  or  of  anything  else)  constitute  a  physical 
basis  of  the  art  of  music,  or  of  any  other  art  or  thing? 
The  physical  basis  of  the  art  of  music  is,  roughly  speak- 
ing, ist,  vibrations;  2d,  air;  and  3d,  man's  auditory 
apparatus.  Can  a  theory  —  nay,  a  part  of  a  theory  — 
"  constitute  "  these? 

•'  He  assumes  no  preliminary  knowledge  save  of 
arithmetic,  and  of  the  musical  notation  in  common  use. 
No  lover  of  music  need  therefore  be  deterred,  by  fear 
of  incompetence  from  the  perusal  of  his  very  interesting 
liltle  volume,  of  which;  however,  we  shall  concern  our- 


54  Music  and  Poetry- 

selves  only  with  the  elementary  parts.  For  they  arc  not 
only  the  most  generally  interesting,  but  they  present  all 
that  is  necessary  to  the  understanding  of  those  relations 
of  sounds  without  which  the  thing  that  modern  and  civ- 
ilized people  call  music  would  be  impossible.  Passing 
over  therefore  what  is  said  by  the  author  upon  sound  in 
general,  which  all  who  read  this  article  probably  know  is 
always  the  product  of  vibration  —  the  vibration,  for 
example,  of  a  string,  of  a  column  of  air  (as  in  a  wind 
instrument),  of  a  piece  of  parchment,  as  in  a  drum, 
which  vibration  communicates  itself  to  the  surrounding 
air  and  is  thus  conveyed  to  the  ear  —  we  come  to  the 
consideration  of  musical  sound  proper.  Mr.  Taylor 
defines  '  a  musical  sound  as  a  steady  sound,  and  a  non- 
musical  sound  as  an  unsteady  sound.'  Without  pro- 
fessing to  be  able  to  give  a  more  descriptive  and  exact 
definition  of  a  musical  sound,  I  cannot  accept  this  one 
as  either  exact  or  descriptive." 

In  which  last  sentence  one  finds  Mr.  White  attacking, 
as  neither  exact  nor  dci^criptive,  the  very  fundamental 
definition  of  a  book  which  he  has  just  declared,  in  the 
third  sentence  back,  to  *•'  present  all  tliat  is  necessary  to 
the  understanding  those  relations  of  sounds"  which 
render  music  possible.  It  may  be  said,  indeed,  that 
Mr.  Taylor,  in  the  effort  to  render  his  book  easily 
understood,  has  made  his  definition  perhaps  needlessly 
meagre.  Every  person  of  average  intelligence  can 
understand  the  principle  upon  which  musical  scientists 
differentiate  a  musical  sound  from  sound  in  general  or 
mere  noise,  to  wit,  that  a  musical  sound  is  one  produced 
by  vibrations  recurring  in  equal  times.  Further  than 
this  no  man  can  go.  Musicalness  —  in  the  sense  in 
which  Mr.  White  attempts  to  "define  "  it — is  a  quality 


The  Physics  of  Music  ^S 

perceived  by  the  ear,  just  as  sweetness  is  a  quality  per- 
ceived by  the  tongue.  Will  any  man  "  define  "  the 
taste  of  sugar? 

"  There  are  many  sounds  which  are  steady  and  which 
are  not  musical,  except  in  a  very  loose  and  unscientific 
as  well  as  inartistic  use  of  that  term.  Such  are  the 
humming  of  a  bee,  the  roar  of  a  waterfall,  the  rumbling 
of  a  ninepin  ball,  and  the  filing  of  a  saw.  Perhaps  a 
musical  sound  might  be  safely  defined  to  be  a  sound 
produced  by  regular  vibrations,  giving  pleasure  to  the 
human  ear,  and  capable  of  being  used  as  a  means  of  ex- 
pression. It  might  be  said  that  regularity  of  vibration 
always  produces  steadiness  of  sound.  This  is  true  :  and 
steadiness  of  sound  is  one,  and  an  essential  element  of 
musical  tone.  But  it  is  not  the  only  one.  The  capa- 
bility of  exciting  pleasure  and  that  of  being  used  as  a 
means  of  expression  seem  to  be  no  less  essential  qualities 
of  any  sound  properly  called  musical." 

This  "  definition  "  of  Mr.  White's  cannot  stand  a  mo- 
ment. A  single  illustration  will  demolish  it :  the  quar- 
ter tones,  for  example,  and  all  tones  less  than  half  tones, 
are  certainly  musical  sounds :  yet  they  fail  in  two  out  of 
Mr.  White's  three  particulars  ;  for  they  do  not  give  pleas- 
ure, and  there  is  no  known  method  by  which  they  can  be 
used  as  a  means  of  expression. 

"  The  possibility  of  music  as  an  art  depends  not  only 
upon  regularity  of  vibration,  but  on  certain  relations 
of  the  vibrations  by  which  sounds  are  produced.  These 
have  been  discovered  by  experiment,  and  are  found  to 
have  certain  laws  which  are  of  mathematical  nature  and 
precision.  Upon  these  relations  harmony  depends  ;  and 
without  harmony  there  is  no  music  ;  for  every  melody 
supposes  a  harmony  upon  which  it  is  said  to  be  based." 


^6  Music  and   Poetry 

But  no  :  the  possibility  of  music  does  not  so  depend, 
nor  does  that  of  harmony :  and  without  harmony  there 
verily  can  be  music.  There  lias  been  music  without 
harmony  pretty  much  ever  since  we  knew  of  anything 
that  has  been  :  and  Melody  was  an  old  man  when  Har- 
mony was  born.  The  Greeks  had  a  great  deal  of  music  : 
but  Mr.  Donkin,  who  is  authority,  does  not  think  they 
had  any  harmony. 

"  A  vibrating  string  affords  the  simplest  and  perhaps 
the  most  trustworthy  means  of  testing  and  analyzing  these 
relations.     A  string  made  to  vibrate  with  sufficient  rapid- 
ity produces  sound   which  will  be  of  a  certain   pitch. 
Now   if  that  string  be  lightly  touched   exactly   in  the 
middle,"  —  (but  why  "  lightly  touched  "  ?     It  will  do  the 
same  thing  if  heavily  touched,  or  if  in  any  way  made 
half  as  long.     INIr.  White  is  thinking  of  harmonic  tones, 
or  overtones.) — "and  the  vibration  kept  up,  the  pitch 
of  the  sound  produced  rises  exactly  an  octave  ;  that  is, 
the  sound  maintains  the  same  relations  to  the  musical 
scale  which  it  had  before,  but  it  is  higher.     To  define  an 
octave  in  this  sense  is  exceedingly  difficult,  simple  as  the 
conception  of  it  is  to  every  musically  endowed  person. 
For  a  note  and  its  octave  are  the  same  and  yet  not  the 
same.     A  melodic  phrase  repeated   in  various  octaves 
has  precisely  the  same  melodic  and  harmonic  relations ; 
it   is   the    same    phrase,   the    same   melody;    and   yet 
the  actual  sounds  produced  may  be  as  unlike  and  as 
remote  as  the    highest   and   shrillest   tone    of  a   violin 
and  those  of  the  lowest   grumblings  of  a  double-bass 

viol." 

The  sweeping  assertion  cannot  be  made  that  an  oc- 
tave has  the  same  harmonic  relations  as  its  fundamental 
tone  :  and  any  person  can  demonstrate  for  himself  that 


The  Physics  of  Music  57 

it  often  has  not.     Let  any  one,  for  example,  strike  the 
following  tones  together  on  a  piano, 


and  he  will  produce  a  jangle  entirely  hideous;  but  let 
him  strike  the  following  : 


i 


I 


-T 

and  although  the  latter  chord  is  wholly  composed  of  oc- 
taves of  the  notes  composing  the  former  one,  the  exper- 
imenter will  hear  a  sound  so  beautiful  that,  for  one,  I 
can  never  get  upon  it  without  lingering  and  lingering, 
for  the  pure  sensuous  beauty  of  it,  —  and  that  in  spite  of 
the  fact  that  it  is  a  chord  of  progress  imperatively  calling 
for  speedy  relief  from  the  tonic.  "  This  rising  of  an 
octave  in  the  sound  of  the  vibrating  string  is  found  to  be 
caused  by  the  doubling  of  the  rapidity  of  the  vibrations. 
The  string  on  being  touched  in  the  middle  divides  itself 
into  two  parts,  and  each  of  these  parts  vibrate  just  twice 
as  fast  as  the  whole  string  does.  An  increase  of  the  rap- 
idity of  the  vibration  does  not  produce  any  difference  in 
the  intensity  or  the  volume  of  sound,  only  in  its  pitch. 
On  the  other  hand,  increased  loudness  of  sound  is 
produced  by  an  increase  of  the  distance  of  vibration. 
The  violin  player  when  he  wishes  to  increase  the  volume 
and  the  intensity  of  his  tone,  presses  his  bow  upon  the 
string    more    firmly  and    moves  it  more    rapidly.     The 


^8  Music  and   Poetry 

string  vibrates  further  —  that  is,  through  a  greater  space 
than  before  —  but  it  makes  no  more  vibrations  in  a 
second  than  it  does  when  he  produces  the  same  note  as 
lightly  and  as  softly  as  possible." 

This  last  proposition  is  true  only  within  limits :  be- 
yond which  the  rapidity  of  vibration  does  vary  with  the 
force  with  which  the  vibrating  body  is  agitated.  Inexpe- 
rienced violin  players  are  often  astonished,  upon  striking 
an  open  string  with  the  bow,  to  hear  the  octave  come  out 
instead  of  the  fundamental  tone  :  by  being  struck  too 
hard,  the  string  has  been  caused  to  form  a  node  in  the 
middle,  and  thus  divide  itself  into  two  vibrating  sections, 
giving  its  octave.  Many  of  the  high  notes  on  wind  instru- 
ments are  made  simply  by  increasing  the  force  of  the 
breath. 

"  A  vibrating  string  may  be  infinitesimally  divided  ; 
the  finger  may  be  nm  up  and  down  the  whole  length  of 
it,  and  the  pitch  of  the  sound  thus  produced  will  rise  and 
fall  accordingly.  But  of  the  sound  thus  produced  only 
that  which  is  heard  at  certain  degrees  is  at  all  available 
for  the  purpose  of  musical  art.  These  degrees  are  those 
which  produce  what  is  called  the  diatonic  scale." 

In  these  last  two  sentences  Mr.  White  sweeps  out  of 
existence,  at  one  blow,  the  chromatic  scale,  and  all  the 
vast  fabric  of  loveliness  which  has  been  built  on  it :  for 
he  declares  that  only  the  sounds  heard  at  such  degrees 
as  produce  the  diato7iic  scale  are  at  all  available  for  the 
purposes  of  musical  art ;  and  inasmuch  as  the  chro- 
matic sounds  (what  the  general  reader  calls  flats  and 
sharps^  are  not  and  cannot  be  heard  at  the  diatonic 
degrees,  —  ergo,  the  chromatic  sounds  are  not  avail- 
able, etc. 

One  may  safely  venture  to  say  that  such  an  assertion 


The  Physics  of  Music  59 

was  never  made  in  the  columns  of  the  Galaxy  or  any 
other  magazine  before. 

"It  is  found  that  the  string  will  divide  itself  into  the 
vibrating  sections  which  produce  these  notes,  on  being 
lightly  touched  (not  shortened  by  being  pressed  down) 
at  certain  places.  This  diatonic  scale  is  therefore  not 
arbitrary,  but  the  result  of  a  law  of  acoustics.  It  exists 
in  nature." 

But  the  fact  is  not  so  :  the  string  will  not  make  the 
diatonic  scale,  when  thus  treated  :  the  diatonic  scale  is 
not  the  result  of  any  known  law  of  acoustics  :  and  it  does 
not  exist  in  nature.  Of  which  any  reader,  musical  or 
otherwise,  can  judge,  after  the  following  short  explana- 
tion. 

If  you  will  take  a  tube  in  the  shape  of  any  horn,  with- 
out keys  or  other  ventages  than  just  the  mouth  and  bell, 
and  of  such  a  length  as  to  make  (say)  the  tone  C  upon 
blowing  into  it  with  a  certain  force  :  then,  upon  increas- 
ing the  force  of  blowing,  it  will  presently  make  the  C  an 
octave  above  ;  it  cannot  be  caused  to  make  any  inter- 
mediate note,  by  force  of  breath  solely.  Blow,  now,  with 
more  force,  and  you  will  get  the  G  above  the  last  C  ; 
with  more  force  still,  you  will  get  the  C  above  that; 
with  more,  the  E  above;  more,  G  above;  more,  A 
above;  more,  a  note  something  like  B  flat  above,  but 
not  B  flat  nor  B  natural ;  more,  C ;  and  so  on  ;  or,  to 
present  the  result  at  a  glance,  you  will  get  the  following, 
in  order  from  the  bottom  : 

nearlv 

V».     '-fi 


^^,=^:.=£=^ 


•-0-       -p- 

•  •  • 
Octave  beloro). 


6o  Music  and  Poetry 

A  string  will  divide  itself  in  the  same  way,  when,  lightly 
touching,  the  finger  is  run  down  it.  The  phenomenon  is 
invariable,  and  is  caused  by  the  singular  property  which 
vibrating  bodies  have  of  dividing  themselves  into  sections, 
separated  by  nodes. 

The  above  series  of  notes  represents  then  what  Mr. 
White  would  get  from  his  string ;  but  tlie  diatonic  scale 
is  this  series  of  notes  : 


i 


S^^-T^T-f-r 


^ 


-&c 


Let  any  one  compare  the  two,  and  say  whether  Mr. 
White  has  enounced  as  a  fundamental  scientific  principle 
what  is  really  only  the  fanciful  hypothesis  of  a  theorizer. 

"  The  melody  and  harmony  which  are  possible  only  by 
means  of  this  scale  are  therefore  dependent  upon  cer- 
tain ratios  of  rapidity  in  vibration.  For  example,  as  we 
have  seen  that  the  octave  or  unison  is  the  product  of  vi- 
brations which  are  as  2  to  i,  we  find  that  the  fifth,  the 
most  perfect  concord,  is  the  product  of  vibrations  which 
are  as  3  to  2.  In  other  words,  when  two  sounds  differ 
by  a  fifth,  the  higher  sound  is  the  product  of  three  vibra- 
tions and  the  lower  of  two  vibrations  during  the  same 
time.  So  when  two  sounds  differ  by  a  fourth,  the  higher 
sound  is  the  product  of  four  vibrations  and  the  lower  of 
three  vibrations  during  the  same  time.  To  follow  these 
proportions  throughout  the  scale  is  needless,  and  would 
be  uninteresting :  for  our  purpose  here  is  only  to  con- 
sider the  nature  of  this  science,  not  to  examine  its  de- 
tails." 

The  first  division  of  this  last  sentence   belongs  also 
among  the  curiosities  of  error.     The  following  of  the  pro- 


The  Physics  of  Music  6i 

portions  referred  to,  throughout  the  scale,  is  not  only  not 
"  needless,"  but  it  is  necessary,  in  any  meagre  examina- 
tion of  the  nature  of  musical  physics ;  and  if  the  reader 
should  think  this  hyper-criticism,  I  have  only  to  refer 
him  to  a  point  a  little  farther  on  in  Mr.  White's  article 
where  this  very  need  has  forced  itself  on  him,  and  where 
he  has  actually  done  the  very  thing  he  here  declares 
needless, —  to  wit,  given  these  very  proportions  through- 
out the  whole  diatonic  scale. 

And  again  :  the  following  of  these  proportions  through- 
out the  scale  is  not  only  7ioi  "  uninteresting,"  but  it  is 
precisely  in  this  connection  that  some  of  the  most  bril- 
liant triumphs  of  modern  science,  —  certainly  the  most 
striking  ones,  to  general  readers  —  have  been  achieved. 
The  wonderful  methods  of  reducing  these  proportions  of 
vibration  to  curves  visible  to  the  eye,  carried  to  such  an 
extent  that  among  musical  scientists  tones  are  known  by 
their  curves ;  and  curious  applications  of  them  to  other 
departments  of  science,  are  always  sure  to  bring  down 
a  lecture-audience  ;  and  when  the  lecturer  proceeds  to 
cast  these  proportions  upon  a  screen,  in  bands  of  brilliant 
light,  and  to  bring  out  the  most  graceful  and  beautiful 
figures,  ever  increasing  in  complexity  as  he  superimposes 
curve  upon  curve  of  note  after  note,  the  enthusiasm  of 
the  dullest  person  is  sure  of  being  aroused.  The  very 
culminating  fascination  of  a  science  which  is  surely  the 
least  dry  of  all  physics,  —  this  is  what  Mr.  White  has  se- 
lected to  pronounce  "  needless  and  uninteresting." 

But  the  limits  of  this  paper  are  being  rapidly  reached, 
and  the  smaller  errors  in  what  follows  must  be  passed 
over  without  mention,  in  order  to  give  room  for  the  ex- 
posure of  one  or  two  more  of  great  importance. 

After  explaining  the  phenomenon  of  resonance  in  a 


62  Music  and  Poetry- 

very  objectionable  way,  Mr.  White  reiterates  in  the  next 
paragraph  the  doctrine  that  the  knowledge  of  the  physics 
of  music  is  "  needless  to  the  artist-musician  "  :  which 
has  already  been  discussed. 

He  then  proceeds  :  "  Musical  sounds  heard  together 
are  concordant  or  discordant.  Discord  is  produced  by 
what  is  called  '  beats ' :  that  is,  the  vibrations  of  the  two 
sounding  bodies  are  so  close  to  each  other  in  their  rapid- 
ity that  they  clash,  and  produce  a  roughness  of  sound 
which  is  painful  to  the  sensitive  ear." 

Leaving  aside  the  thorough  insufficiency  of  Mr.  White's 
explanation  of  "  beats,"  and  regretting,  particularly  on 
account  of  the  prominence  of  this  phenomenon  in 
modern  musical  physics,  that  the  deficiency  cannot  be 
remedied  here,  it  must  be  said  that  the  theory  of  "  beats  " 
as  the  physical  origin  of  discord  has  been  so  qualified 
and  eviscerated  even  by  those  who  were  most  committed 
to  it,  that  it  has  been  practically  abandoned.  It  was 
first  announced  by  Professor  Helmholtz  ;  but,  in  spite  of 
the  magnificent  authority  which  that  great  philosopher 
exercises  in  all  departments  of  physical  science,  the  the- 
ory was  found  to  fail  utterly,  by  practical  musicians  : 
it  had  to  be  modified,  limited ;  and  so,  what  with 
modification  and  limitation,  it  may  now  be  said  to 
be  pretty  much  no  theory.  The  very  book  which  Mr. 
W^hite  is  reviewing  in  this  article  is  careful  to  protect  it- 
self on  this  point ;  yet  Mr.  White  announces  it  as  if  it 
were  an  unquestioned  principle.  In  truth,  —  without  at 
all  wishing  to  be  dogmatic,  —  it  can  be  mathematically 
shown,  and  experimentally  shown,  that  beats  have  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  discord,  in  the  generally  received 
sense  of  the  word  "  discord  "  :  and  it  is  only  by  making 
the  word  "discord  "  have  the  same  meaning  as  the  word 


The  Physics  of  Music  6^ 

"  concord  "  that  its  most  desperate  advocates  have  been 
able  to  maintain  any  ground  :  which  is  much  as  if  one 
should  assert  that  a  horse  is  a  cow,  and  then  protect  his 
assertion  by  the  proviso  that  in  using  the  term  "  horse  " 
he  meant  —  not  the  animal  commonly  so  named  —  but  an 
animal  with  horns  and  a  milk-bag. 

After  instancing  some  discordant  intervals,  the  paper 
proceeds : 

"  Concords  consist  at  most  of  but  three  notes.  From 
the  largest  orchestra,  as  from  a  mere  stringed  quartette 
or  a  pianoforte,  if  we  hear  a  concord,  we  hear  but  three 
notes  —  doubled,  trebled,  or  quadrupled  through  the 
octaves  included  within  the  range  of  the  instruments. 
And  the  following  triads  include  all  the  concords  that 
can  be  heard  : 


i 


±^ 


=g= 


^-         -3-  -^  -<5^  -^^  -<S>-  -<5^ 

These  triads  contain  the  tonic  in  combination  with  the 
minor  third  and  fifth,  with  the  major  third  and  fifth, 
with  the  minor  third  and  minor  sixth,  with  the  major 
thirci  and  major  sixth,  with  the  fourth  and  the  minor 
sixth,  with  the  fourth  and  the  major  sixth.  Their  char- 
acter is  determined  by  the  third,  in  whatever  part  of  the 
triad  it  appears.  There  are  three  major  triads  and 
three  minor.  These  chords,  or  their  inversions,  are  all 
the  concords  that  we  hear." 

To  this  there  are  five  serious  objections.  First,  upon 
any  reader  not  already  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  sub- 
ject it  makes  an  impression  just  as  wrong  as  wrong  can 
be-:  and  this  impression  will  linger  until  the  reader  is 
told  that  the  words  "concord"  and  "  discord,"  "  con- 


64  Music  and  Poetry 

cordant  "  and  "discordant,"  as  here  used,  have  no  ref- 
erence to  the  common  signification  of  those  words  as 
denoting  chords  agreeable  or  disagreeable  to  the  ear. 
The  chord  which  was  given  just  now  by  me  as  one  of 
the  most  beautiful  chords  in  all  music,  contains  one  of 
those  sevenths  which  Mr.  White  declares  to  be  the  most 
"discordant"  interval  of  the  scale:  and  the  whole 
chord  is  a  discord,  in  the  terminology  here  used  by  Mr. 
White.  How  this  anomalous  terminology  has  grown  up 
in  Thorough-bass  cannot  here  be  explained.  Bearing 
this  anomaly  in  mind,  any  reader  will  perceive  that  the 
wonder  intended  to  be  excited  by  the  second  sentence 
of  this  last  extract  will  necessarily  be  wholly  based  on  a 
misunderstanding  by  the  reader  of  the  word  "  concord  " 
therein  used. 

But  this  is  scarcely  the  beginning  of  transgressions, 
with  this  unlucky  last  extract.  It  contains  at  least  two 
errors  of  statement,  and  three  of  substance.  I  have 
already  spoken  of  one  of  the  errors  of  statement.  The 
other  is  contained  in  the  last  sentence  of  the  extract, 
when  taken  in  connection  with  the  rest.  Mr.  White 
says:  "These  chords,  or  their  inversions,  are  all  the 
concords  that  we  hear."  If  Mr.  A.  T.  Stewart  should 
cause  a  clipping  as  big  as  a  pin-head  to  be  made  from 
off  each  different  sort  of  goods  in  his  retail-store,  and 
holding  them  all  in  his  hands  should  declare  that  what 
he  there  held,  was  all  he  had  in  that  store,  we  would 
either  understand  him  to  mean  that  what  he  held  was  a 
sample  of  all  in  the  store,  or  we  would  understand  him 
to  be  crazy.  Mr.  White's  well-demonstrated  force  of  in- 
tellect will  not  admit  such  a  supposition  as  this  last; 
therefore  every  musician  must  believe  that  in  this  state- 
ment he  merely  means  that  the  chords  he  enumerates 


The  Physics  of  Music  6^ 

are  samples  as  it  were  of  all  the  technical  concords  we 
hear.  But  I  submit  if  any  untechnical  reader  would 
gather  aught  but  error  from  the  statement  as  made. 

To  go  on,  however,  to  errors  of  substance  :  the  state- 
ment, as  made,  is  absurdly  erroneous  in  point  of  fact. 
The  chords  numbered  i  and  2  (they  have  been  num- 
bered by  me  for  convenient  reference)  are  the  only 
generic  chords  (iu  the  technical  sense  which  Mr.  White 
is  here  himself  employing)  in  the  enumeration ;  the 
other  four  are  only  inversions  of  chords  identical  in  for- 
mation with  the  first  two.  No.  3  is  only  an  inversion 
of  a  triad  which  is  formed  on  A  flat  in  precisely  the 
same  way  as  number  2  is  formed  on  C.  So,  also,  4  and 
5  are  only  inversions  of  a  minor  chord  formed  precisely 
as  I  is  formed.  When,  therefore,  Mr.  White  speaks,  in 
the  last  sentence  of  this  extract,  of  "  these  chords  or 
their  inversions  "  ("  these  chords  "  being,  as  detailed  in 
the  previous  sentence,  the  "  three  major  triads  and 
three  minor  triads"),  he  speaks  an  absurdity  as  to  four 
out  of  the  six  chords  :  for  those  four  are  themselves  in- 
versions, and  are  not  capable  of  inversion,  which  is  a 
process  performed  only  upon  such  triads  as  i  and  2. 

The  second  error  of  substance  is  :  that  Mr.  White's 
enumeration  of  triads  entirely  omits  the  well-known 
diminished  triad  formed  on  the  seventh  degree  of  the 
scale,  which  is  generically  different  from  both  i  and  2. 

A  third  error  of  substance  consists  in  Mr.  White's 
failure  to  mention  the  method  of  varying  the  typical 
chords  by  dispersion,  —  a  method  co-extensive  with  that 
vast  range  of  notes  found  between  the  double-bass  and 
the  piccolo,  and  quite  as  effectual  as  inversion. 

The  next  paragraph  of  Mr.  White's  paper  is  devoted 
to  temperament;  it  is  the  one  which  contains  the  de- 

S 


S6  Music  and  Poetry 

tailed  enumeration  of  the  proportions  of  vibration  be- 
tween all  the  notes  in  the  scale,  which  has  been  herein 
before  referred  to.  This  paragraph  is  also  in  error. 
"But  even  they"  {i.e.,  stringed  instruments)  "are  not 
absolutely  perfect,  because  they  must  have  four  notes  of 
a  fixed  pitch,  whereas  absolutely  perfect  intonation  ad- 
mits of  but  one  note  the  pitch  of  which  is  fixed,  —  the 
tonic." 

Now  the  violin  (for  example  :  the  same  remark  ap- 
plies to  all  the  strings),  so  far  from  having  four  notes 
fixed,  has  but  one  ;  and  that  one  is  only  fixed,  quoad 
flattening ;  it  can  be  made  as  much  sharper  as  the  per- 
former desires.  The  D,  A,  and  E  of  the  violin's  open 
strings  can  be  varied  at  will. 

I  will  not  pursue  the  next  paragraph,  in  which  Mr. 
White  discusses  with  Mr.  Taylor  whether  a  basso  would 
be  able  to  take  an  E  flat  true,  after  an  F  sharp  with 
thirteen  bars  rest.  Mr.  Taylor  thinks  the  basso  could 
not,  and  wishes  to  recommend  a  system  of  notation 
which  would  help  him  to  do  it  better  than  the  system 
now  in  use.  Mr.  White  thinks  the  basso  would  do  it 
without  difificulty;  he  is  sure  he  would  after  the  first 
trial,  "because  he  would  feel  intuitively  the  position 
of  E  flat  in  the  chord  on  which  he  was  to  come  in." 
But  if  he  came  in  no  chord,  in  solo  :  or  if,  coming  in  on 
a  chord,  he  had  no  intermediate  cue  from  the  other 
voices,  how  then?  In  fact — by  way  of  reply  to  Mr. 
White's  airy  dismissal  of  Mr.  Taylor's  point  —  I  have 
seen  the  oldest  strings  in  the  orchestra  boggle  over  much 
easier  intervals  than  that  from  F  sharp  to  E  flat  after 
thirteen  bars'  rest. 

And  now,  inasmuch  as  here  ends  the  scientific  portion 
of  Mr.  White's  article,  one  would   think  he   could  not 


The  Physics  of  Music  67 

commit  any  more  errors  on  that  subject.  Yet  he  has ; 
and  they  are  worse  than  any  that  have  been  specified. 
They  consist  in  what  he  has  7wi  said. 

What  would  be  thought  of  any  presentation,  however 
meagre,  of  the  science  of  optics  which  did  not  even  so 
much  as  mention  the  fact  that  white  h'ght  is  composite, 
and  which  contained  not  a  soUtary  reference  to  the 
prism  or  the  spectroscope? 

The  fault  of  omission  in  the  paper  we  have  been  dis- 
cussing is  precisely  similar.  //  does  not  so  much  as 
mention  that  the  musical  tones  ordinarily  heard  are 
highly  composite  in  their  nature,  —  a  fact  from  which 
flow  many  of  the  most  interesting  portions  of  the  physi- 
cal science  of  music  ;  nor  does  it  contain  a  solitary  refer- 
ence to  the  Siren  —  that  beautiful  instrument,  the  vade 
mecum  of  the  musical  physicist,  with  which  he  has 
accomplished  so  many  wonders. 

In  truth,  when  one  reads  in  the  concluding  paragraph 
of  this  presentation  of  musical  physics,  that  "  from  what 
has  been  said  the  musical  reader  will  gather  something 
of  what  the  Science  of  Music  really  is,"  may  not  one 
ask,  without  incurring  any  accusation  of  flippantly  taking 
words  out  of  one's  opponent's  mouth,  if  "  from  what  has 
been  said  "  the  musical  reader  will  not  gather  a  great 
deal  of  what  the  Science  of  Music  really  is  noti 


68  Music  and  Poetry 


IV 

Two   Descriptive  Orchestral  Works 

Rubinstein's  "  Ocean  Symphony "  and  Hart- 
mann's  "  Raid  of  the  Vikings  " 

[The  following  is  a  fragment  of  Mr.  Lanier's  interpretation  of 
these  two  musical  works  upon  the  occasion  of  their  production  at 
the  first  Peabody  concert  of  i8So.  Much  of  the  original  article, 
indeed  most  of  the  discussion  from  the  standpoint  of  a  musical 
critic,  was  omitted  by  the  daily  paper  in  which  it  appeared.  The 
"  Maryland  Musical  Festival,"  in  the  next  chapter,  is  also  very 
fragmentary,  from  the  same  reason.] 

The  opening  movement  (of  Emil  Hartmann's  overture 
"  The  Raid  of  the  Vikings  ")  seems  to  show  us  the  Vilcings 
taking  a  tender   leave  of  wives  and   sweethearts,   and 
solemnly  committing  themselves  to  the  Higher  Powers 
as  they  embark  on  their  expedition.     A  sudden  change 
in  the  music  presents  the  great  sea  ships  bounding  off 
before  a  keen  and  whistling  wind,  impatient  warriors 
striding  about  the  deck,  eager  preludes  of  the  battle- 
tune.     Other  changes  bring  forward  in  succession  the 
fierce  descent  on  the  coast,  the  march  into  battle,  the 
fi"-ht   the  victorious  return.    As  this  is  an  overture,  these 
changes  take  place  without  such  pauses  between  them  as 
separate   the  longer   movements  of  a  symphony.      In 
Rubinstein's  Symphony  we  have  still  the  sea,  but  a  wholly 
different  sea  of  associations.     The  first  movement  opens 


Two   Descriptive  Orchestral  Works     69 

up  to  us  the  expanse  of  the  ocean ;  we  exult  in  a  free 
and  melodious  swing  of  waves ;  we  "  hear  old  Triton 
blow  his  wreathed  horn,"  the  waters  laugh  in  the  sunlight, 
yet  withal  a  certain  mystery  creeps  about,  especially 
where,  while  the  violins  are  sending  out  a  clear  and 
fluent  melody,  we  distinguish  the  clarionet,  in  a  strange, 
broken,  and  wholly  different  tune,  singing  like  a  siren 
under  the  sea  of  sound.  In  the  second  movement  noth- 
ing could  be  more  suggestive  of  the  interminable  wallow 
and  welter  of  waves  than  the  singular  violoncello  accom- 
paniment to  the  lovely  melody  of  violins  and  clarionet, 
immediately  following  the  first  two  chords  of  this  move- 
ment. The  terror  of  the  great  deep,  the  perils  of  them 
that  go  down  to  the  sea  in  ships,  the  helplessness  of  man 
before  this  prodigious  power,  the  inexorable  riddle  of 
sudden  death,  the  despair  of  the  drowning  man,  tem- 
pests turned  into  melodious  lamentation,  prayer,  the 
endless  protest  and  longing  of  bereaved  love,  —  all  these 
are  typified  in  this  movement.  The  third  movement 
pictures  the  uncouth  and  awkward  jollity  of  sailors  on 
ship-board,  and  the  fourth,  after  many  monstrous  ideas, 
alternating  with  solemn  chorales,  ends  in  a  mighty  sea- 
hymn. 


yo  Music  and  Poetry 


The  Maryland  Musical  Festival 


The  whole  of  the  music  during  the  evening  was 
Beethoven's,  and  it  was  so  selected  as  to  present  an 
admirable  opportunity  for  studying  the  genius  of  this 
Shakspere  of  tone  in  its  two  greatest  aspects,  to  wit : 
with  regard  to  his  love  for  physical  nature  and  his  love 
for  human  nature. 

The  Seventh  Syrhphony,  with  which  the  concert 
opened,  cannot  be  properly  criticised  without  reference 
to  the  curious  relation  which  Beethoven  bears  to  the  dis- 
tinctive culture  of  our  day.  That  culture  is  rooted  in 
physical  science.  The  thirst  after  exact  knowledge  of 
the  secrets  of  the  physical  universe  is  the  characteristic 
mark  by  which  the  modern  epoch  differentiates  itself  from 
the  mediaeval  and  the  antique.  Now  it  is  a  circumstance 
probably  not  yet  sufficiently  appreciated  that  the  same 
age  which  has  developed  physical  science  to  an  extent 
undreamed  of  by  ancient  philosophers  has  also  developed 
music  to  an  extent  undreamed  of  by  ancient  artists. 

The  hearer  of  the  Seventh  Symphony  last  night  —  and, 
it  may  be  added,  of  the  descriptive  piece  called  "  The 
Calm  of  the  Sea  "  —  will  find  himself  at  the  verge  of  a 
whole  new  field  of  appreciation  for  those  pieces  if  he 

1  A  Musical  Festival  held  in  Baltimore  in  May,  1878,  and  ex- 
tending over  several  days. 


The  Maryland  Musical  Festival        71 

will  remember  that  the  same  era  which  produces  Maillet, 
Darwin,  Spencer,  Huxley,  and  Tyndall  has  produced  also 
Beethoven  in  music  and  the  landscape  school  in  painting. 
For  these  three  phenomena — the  modern  scientist,  the 
musician,  and  the  landscape  painter  —  are  merely  three 
developments,  in  different  directions,  of  one  mighty  im- 
pulse which  under-runs  them  all.  This  impulse  is  that 
direct  sympathy  with  physical  nature  which  the  man  of 
to-day  possesses,  and  which  the  man  of  old  did  not 
possess.  The  Greek  had  an  intermediate  set  of  beings 
between  him  and  his  mother  earth ;  he  invented  the 
Faun,  the  Oread,  and  the  Nymph  to  stand  between  man 
on  the  one  side,  and  the  forest,  the  mountain,  the  stream 
on  the  other. 

We  are  under  no  such  necessity.  Our  Darwin  boldly 
takes  hold  of  Nature  as  if  it  were  a  rose,  pulls  it  to  pieces, 
puts  it  under  the  microscope,  and  reports  to  us  what  he 
saw  without  fear  or  favor.  Beethoven,  on  the  other 
hand,  approaching  the  same  good  Nature  —  from  a  dif- 
ferent direction,  with  different  motives  —  and  looking 
upon  it  with  the  artist's  —  not  the  scientist's  —  eye,  finds 
it  a  beautiful  whole ;  he  does  not  analyze,  but,  pursuing 
the  synthetic  process,  shows  it  to  us  as  a  perfect  rose, 
reporting  his  observations  to  us  in  terms  of  harmony. 

Now  those  who  reverently  listened  to  the  performance 
of  the  Seventh  Symphony  of  last  night,  as  if  Beethoven 
had  come  back  from  a  journey  under  bases  of  mountains 
and  roots  of  flowers,  and  was  telling  us  what  he  saw, 
were  in  the  way  towards  a  proper  reception  of  the 
majesty  and  delicacy  of  this  wonderful  music.  As  the 
first  movement  opened  with  a  full  chord  the  hautboys 
emerged  from  the  mass  of  tone  like  the  slender  fairy 
emerging  from  the  petals  of  the  great  lily  in  the  Panto- 


72  Music  and   Poetry 

mime.  The  introduction  then  proceeded  with  continu- 
ous majesty  to  the  curious  dialogue  of  the  flute  and 
reeds,  which  seems  as  if  two  voices  were  calling  to  each 
other  from  the  opposite  ends  of  creation,  and  then  these 
two  voices  fused  and  begun  the  vivacious  melody  which 
continues  to  the  end  of  the  movement.  As  the  orches- 
tra began  the  strange  sigh  which  initiates  the  second 
movement,  there  was  a  perceptible  settling  of  the  audi- 
ence, and  a  quietude  or  attention  that  gave  admirable 
scope  to  the  low  throbbing  which  the  strings  set  up,  as 
if  one  were  in  that  silence  which  Lord  Houghton  has  so 
well  described  in  his  famous 

"  The  beating  of  our  own  hearts 
Was  all  the  sound  we  heard." 

The  strings  beat  like  a  heart.  This  second  movement 
is  in  fact  a  wonderful  march,  in  which  the  rhythm  of  the 
step  is  also  the  rhythm  of  the  human  heart-beat.  We 
all  remember  where  our  own  poet  uses  this  same  associa- 
tion of  rhythms  in  the  sentiment  that  our  hearts,  like 
muffled  drums,  are  beating  funeral  marches  to  the  tomb. 
I  make  no  doubt  Beethoven  was  thinking  of  this  typical 
organ  of  man's  life  beating  its  way  through  the  dangers 
of  physical  nature  from  birth  to  death. 

It  is  interesting  to  compare  the  final  utterance  of  great 
souls  in  the  presence  of  this  death,  the  most  enormous 
phenomenon  which  confronts  him  who  looks  into  Nature. 
Life,  cries  an  old  Greek  poet,  is  but  a  passage  from  the 
tomb  to  the  tomb.  Our  little  life,  says  Shakspere,  is 
rounded  with  a  sleep.  What  Beethoven  says  in  this 
second  movement  is  essentially  the  same.  No  one 
could  have  failed  to  notice  the  profound  sigh  which  the 
wind   instruments  so  admirably  rendered  last  night  at 


The   Maryland  Musical  Festival        73 

the  beginning  and  again  at  the  close  of  this  movement. 
In  thus  inclosing  the  beating  of  the  human  heart  be- 
tween two  sighs,  the  great  musician  has  but  echoed 
Shakspere  and  the  Greek  poet.  From  a  sigh  to  a  sigh 
—  that  is  the  musical  exclamation  of  Beethoven  when 
confronting  the  awful  physical  facts  of  birth  and  death. 

The  third  movement  of  the  symphony  changed  the 
theme  to  the  wild,  lonesome,  and  secret  powers  of  Nature. 
Some  weeks  ago  a  suggestion  in  regard  to  this  move- 
ment was  made  in  a  public  print,  which  was  so  striking 
and  beautiful  that  it  should  not  be  allowed  to  pass 
away.  It  was  that  this  third  movement  was  like  the 
flight  of  bats  and  swallows  from  a  ruin. 

Every  one  who  heard  the  movement  played  last  night 
must  remember  how  perfectly  this  idea  of  the  rallying 
forth  of  birds,  and  their  constant  return,  from  and  to  a 
ruin,  at  twilight  or  in  darkness,  was  embodied  by  the 
flutterings  out  and  in  of  the  wind-tones,  which  constantly 
skimmed  out,  sailed  around,  and  then  returned  to  hide 
themselves  in  the  crevices  of  silence. 

In  the  fourth  movement,  again,  we  saw  the  gigantic 
figure  of  jovial  animality  in  nature  careering  about  the 
world  of  tone  in  unrestrained  jubilation.  It  was  the 
play  of  that  impulse  under  which  the  colts  caper 
in  meadows  and  students  yell  burschen  songs  over 
their  beer.  One  could  but  remember,  as  the  orchestra 
crashed  and  thundered  through  this  movement,  the 
words  of  Mozart  when  he  heard  the  young  Beethoven 
play:  "This  youth,"  he  said,  "will  one  day  make  a 
noise  in  the  world."  The  fourth  movement  of  the 
symphony  certainly  fulfilled  the  prediction  in  both 
senses. 

The  "  Calm  of  the  Sea  "  was  admirably  rendered,  both 


74  Music  and  Poetry 

by  orchestra  and  chorus.  It  is  not  necessary  here  to 
interpret  Beethoven's  nature-worship  in  this  remarkable 
composition,  for  the  words  of  the  song  are  like  stage 
directions  to  the  mighty  sea  drama  which  was  enacted 
in  his  mind  during  its  composition.  Every  one  could 
understand  the  broad,  blue,  transparent  phrases  of  the 
calm,  and  the  riotous  exultation  of  bounding  wave  and 
favorable  breeze,  with  the  jovial  yo-heave  of  the  sailors 
in  the  succeeding  strain.  The  performance  of  the 
chorus  brought  great  and  deserved  applause  from  the 
house.     The  body  of  tone  was  certainly  glorious. 

I  have  taken  these  two  pieces  together  because  they 
belong  to  the  nature-loving  side  of  Beethoven's  genius. 
When  we  came  to  the  other  pieces  on  the  programme 
we  find  them  all  flowing  out  of  his  other  side,  the 
humanly  affectionate  passions  in  which  he  was  so 
mighty.  As  representing  these  emotions  Mr.  Rem- 
mertz  sang  "  In  Questa  Tomba"  and  "Adelaide."  His 
rendition  of  these  works  was,  for  the  first,  exceedingly 
noble  and  mournful,  and  for  the  last,  full  of  the  ecstasy 
of  passionate  tenderness.  If  "  Adelaide  "  is  the  most 
tender  love  song,  "  In  Questa  Toraba  "  is  the  most  ma- 
jestic death  song  in  the  world.  Mr.  Remmertz's  beauti- 
ful voice  interpreted  those  compositions  well ;  and  one 
can  say  little  more  than  that. 

The  piano  concerto  (in  G  —  played  by  Madame  Falk- 
Auerbach)  refers  also  to  the  human  side  of  Beethoven. 
The  second  movement  particularly  impresses  all  as  a 
great  discussion  between  justice  on  the  one  hand  and 
mercy  on  the  other,  the  stern  strings  in  unison  repre- 
senting the  former,  and  the  serene  piano  tones  the  latter. 
Madame  Auerbach's  conception  and  execution  of  this 
piece  is  beyond  all  praise.     Her  greatness  and  simplic- 


The   Maryland   Musical   Festival        75 

ity  seem  to  be  genuine  emanations  from  Beethoven's 
genius. 

The  Leonora  Overture  has  been  often  heard  and  criti- 
cised here,  and  it  is  only  necessary  to  say  now  that  it 
was,  as  a  whole,  the  best  orchestral  performance  of  the 
evening  as  to  technical  merit. 

The  well-known  Hallelujah  chorus  from  the  "  Mount 
of  Olives"  terminated  in  fine  style  the  most  notable 
concert  ever  given  in  Baltimore. 

■  ••••• 

With  last  night's  concert  closed  the  first  Maryland 
musical  festival,  at  the  Academy  of  Music.  An  audience 
larger  and,  if  possible,  more  brilliant  than  that  of  the 
opening,  attended  and  enthusiastically  applauded  it  to 
the  end.  As  on  Tuesday  evening  too,  it  was  upon  the 
conjunction  of  chorus,  orchestra,  piano,  and  soli  that 
expectancy  mainly  rested,  and  that  stood  the  severest 
test  of  merit.  The  soli  in  the  Choral  Fantasy  from  Bee- 
thoven, which  united  the  whole  force  of  the  festival, 
were  Misses  Baraldi,  Kate  Benner,  Jennie  Myers, 
Chisholm,  Seeger,  Herman,  Gillett,  Emma  Dressel,  and 
Mrs.  Neilson;  Messrs.  John  Schomann,  Schmidt,  Kai- 
ser, Wahman,  Bitter,  Steinmuller,  and  Mr.  Brown,  of 
Wilmington,  Del.  The  receipts  of  the  festival,  although 
not  yet  officially  ascertained,  will  be  in  the  neighborhood 
of  $3,000. 

Coming  now  to  the  set  programme,  there  is  a  point 
of  view  from  which  it  becomes  exceedingly  interesting 
to  compare  the  Gade  Symphony  (opus  5,  C  minor), 
which  opened  the  first  part  of  the  programme,  with  the 
beautiful  "  Jewish  Trilogy  "  of  Hamcrik,  which  opened 
the  second  part,  and  for  this  purpose  the  latter  will 
have  to  be  considered  out  of  its  order.     It  must  have 


76  Music  and  Poetry 

forcibly  struck  every  one  who  heard  the  Jewish  Trilogy 
last  night  that  from  beginning  to  end  it  breathes  forth 
the  vital  spirit  of  that  wonderful  race  in  a  veritable 
orchestral  song.  That  a  young  composer,  the  pupil 
and  friend  of  Gade  (that  most  Norse  of  modern  Norse- 
men), and  saturated  from  early  life  with  those  striking 
idiosyncrasies  which  so  thoroughly  differentiate  Norse 
compositions  in  general  from  all  others,  should  thus 
successfully  project  himself  beyond  himself  and  into  the 
very  heart  of  a  culture  so  complex  and  unique  as  that 
of  the  Jews,  argues  a  dramatic  power  which  should  be 
welcomed  with  pride  and  delight.  It  was  for  the  pur- 
pose of  calling  special  attention  to  this  display  of  dra- 
matic power  in  the  Trilogy  that  a  comparison  of  it  with 
the  Gade  Symphony  was  invited  in  the  beginning  of 
this  article.  The  latter  is,  perhaps,  the  loveliest  and 
most  conclusive  type  of  the  whole  genius  of  Norse 
music  ever  written.  The  waves  of  the  wild  seas,  the 
depths  of  great  forests  in  which  hunters  roam  and  elves 
dance  by  night,  the  passionate  love-making  of  men  at 
once  fierce  and  tender,  and,  finally,  the  marches  and 
jubilations  of  heroes  with  blonde  beards  and  massive 
sinews,  —  in  fine,  all  those  representative  ideas  which  pass 
through  our  minds  at  the  mention  of  the  Norseman's 
name,  are  set  forth  in  this  symphony  with  a  clearness 
and  gracious  splendor  of  instrumental  effects  beyond  de- 
scription. When,  therefore,  those  who  heard  the  Sym- 
phony and  the  Trilogy  in  such  close  contact  last  night 
remember  how  captivating  are  the  strongly  marked 
harmonic  progressions  of  the  former,  and  how  firmly 
they  must  have  fixed  themselves  in  the  nature  of  one 
who  comes,  as  does  Mr.  Hamerik,  from  the  very  home 
of  such  music,  they  will  readily  perceive  that  the  Trilogy, 


The  Mar\'land  Musical  Festival        77 

which  differs  from  the  Symphony  as  widely  as  a  Jew 
differs  from  a  Dane,  is  a  real  exploit  of  genius. 

Madame  Auerbach's  performance  of  the  piano  part  in 
the  Choral  Fantasy  displayed  all  those  qualities  which 
have  given  her  an  easy  place  among  the  first  artists  of 
the  world.  Without  notes,  as  usual,  and  with  a  sim- 
plicity of  behavior  as  truly  admirable  as  it  is  unusual, 
she  sat  at  the  piano,  and  throughout  the  whole  long  part 
given  to  that  instrument  sustained  the  solo  singers,  the 
chorus,  and  the  orchestra  with  her  surprising  airy  disposal 
of  technical  difficulties  and  her  bright  precision  of  attack. 

Those  who  heard  Mr.  Remmertz's  powerful  rendition 
of  the  air  from  Handel's  "  Samson  "  will  not  hesitate 
at  sympathizing  with  the  utterance  of  Moscheles  upon 
his  great  work :  "  Handel's  '  Samson,'  which  always 
strengthens  and  elevates  my  soul.  The  first  time  I 
heard  it  I  was  in  ecstasies  of  delight ;  since  then  I 
have  heard  every  rehearsal  and  performance  of  this 
masterpiece,  and  always  found  myself  refreshed  anew." 
Handel's  mother  had  herself  become  blind,  and  he  must 
have  known  personally  that  passion  of  tenderness  which 
cries  in  the  aria,  "  Whilst  I  have  eyes,  he  wants  no 
light."  This  oratorio  was  brought  out,  too,  after  Han- 
del's triumphant  re-entry  into  London,  which  he  had 
quitted  in  debt  and  disfavor.  One  easily  fancies  that 
a  certain  strain  of  triumph,  born  out  of  these  memo- 
ries, is  also  to  be  detected  in  these  broad  and  manly 
phrases  which  Mr.  Remmertz  rendered  with  such  noble 
conception. 

The  last  three  numbers  of  the  programme  were  de- 
voted to  Richard  Wagner.  Of  the  "Siegfried  Idyl" — 
the  first  of  these  three  —  an  analysis  is  not  possible  in 
the  limited  space  at  command,  but  there  is  one  view  of 


78  Music  and  Poetry- 

it  so  curious  as  to  merit  special  mention.  We  have  all 
seen  a  certain  cyclic  tendency  of  modern  things  to 
return  to  old  forms.  We  have  seen  modern  science 
reverting  to  and  rcaifirming  the  atomic  theories  of  an 
ancient  Greek  speculator.  We  have  seen  medicine  re- 
confirming itself  with  the  maxims  of  old  Hippocrates, 
and  Hahnemann  erecting  into  a  practical  system  tlie 
similia  similihus  of  Paracelsus.  In  the  same  way  one 
finds  Wagner  in  the  "  Siegfried  Idyl "  using,  with  a 
freer  development,  the  old  form  of  music  known  as  the 
Discant.  From  the  thirteenth  century  to  the  sixteenth 
the  Discant  was  the  typic  form  of  concerted  music.  It 
consisted  of  several  melodies,  which  were  sung  inde- 
pendently by  different  voices,  but  which  were  so  con- 
structed as  not  to  jar  with  each  other  save  in  merely 
passing  discords.  Wagner  appears  to  revive  this  form 
of  polyphonic  music  in  the  Idyl  —  and,  indeed,  in  much 
of  his  other  orchestral  work  —  and  to  support  it  with 
the  wholly  modern  art  of  harmony. 

This  is  the  explanation  of  much  of  the  difficulty  which 
most  persons  feel  in  perceiving  the  drift  of  Wagner's 
pieces.  Probably  it  will  be  long  before  the  ears  of 
average  audiences  will  be  practised  to  such  keenness 
that  they  can  detect  the  multitudinous  melodies  which 
arise,  sing  together,  vanish,  and  re-appear,  all  through 
the  Idyl.  First  the  violins  give  out  a  beautiful  tune: 
presently  from  another  side  of  the  orchestra  a  different 
tune  strikes  in,  then  another  from  another  side,  and  so 
on  until  every  instrument  is  engaged  simultaneously  in 
playing  independent  tunes.  To  follow  these  through 
their  sinuous  windings  and  interweavings  is  possible  only 
to  a  practised  ear  and  concentrated  attention.  An  idea 
of  the  continual  motion  of  these  strange  tunes  will  be 


The   Maryland  Musical  Festival        79 

gained  by  any  one  who  has  ever  stood  near  the  pool 
in  Druid  Hill  Park  and  watched  the  fish  in  the  depths 
of  the  water.  First  one  sees  the  gleam  of  an  upturned 
silvery  side  far  down,  as  one  hears  some  bright  momen- 
tary phrase  in  the  Idyl ;  then  a  subdued  flash  here  and 
there  below  the  surface  of  the  water  calls  our  attention 
to  dimly  outlined  forms  swimming  underneath ;  then 
the  whole  brilliant  shoal  rises  to  the  top  and  shines 
in  the  sunlight,  as  in  those  glorious  crescendos  and 
sudden  outbursts  when  Wagner  puts  the  whole  orches- 
tra to  bowing  and  beating  for  dear  life ;  then  the  shoal 
again  sinks,  the  dark  forms  of  the  fish  move  hither  and 
thither  under  the  water,  and  finally  all  disappear. 

In  the  Scene  and  Romance  from  "  Tannhauser,"  Mr. 
Remmertz  merited  all  that  praise  which  becomes  mo- 
notonous when  we  have  to  speak  of  his  performance. 

The  concert  closed  with  the  March  and  Chorus  from 
"  Tannhauser,"  and  it  is  enough  praise  for  this  special 
performance  to  say  that  it  was  a  fitting  termination  to 
the  two  concerts.  The  chorus  which  has  gone  through 
these  trying  rehearsals  deserve  every  mark  of  recognition 
for  its  constancy  and  its  musical  grasp  of  the  conductor's 
ideas.  The  brilliant  outburst  of  tone  in  the  sharp  key 
of  the  Tannhauser  Chorus  revealed  the  capabilities  of 
the  choral  members  perhaps  more  clearly  than  anything 
they  have  sung,  and  bred  the  universal  wish  that  the 
organization  thus  begun  might  become  permanent  in 
the  form  of  a  choral  association.  Taken  as  a  whole, 
the  concert  was  probably  a  more  enjoyable  one  to  an 
average  audience  than  that  of  the  previous  night,  and 
the  heartiness  and  spontaneity  of  the  applause  crowned 
with  unmistakable  approval  this  first  effort  towards  a 
Maryland  musical  festival. 


8o  Music  and  Poetry 


VI 

The   Centennial   Cantata 

[A  letter  printed  in  the  New  York  Tribune,  in  May  1876: 
when  the  premature  publication  of  the  Cantata  —  in  advance  of 
its  musical  presentation  —  had  subjected  it  to  widespread 
misconception.] 

I  ASK  space  in  your  columns  for  calling  the  atten- 
tion of  my  brother  artists  in  America  to  a  field  of 
inquiry  whose  results,  though  as  yet  partial,  are  so  curi- 
ous that  I  cannot  but  believe  some  account  of  them  will 
be  at  once  of  genuine  service  to  American  art  and  of  in- 
terest to  your  readers. 

Probably  there  are  not  five  English-speaking  persons 
who  have  ever  given  an  hour's  systematic  thought  to  the 
following  question  :  What  changes  have  been  made  in 
the  relations  of  Poetry  to  Music  by  the  prodigious  mod- 
ern development  of  the  orchestra? 

It  is  probably  known  to  most  even  of  non-musical 
readers  that  the  orchestra  of  to-day  compares  with  the 
early  orchestra  much  as  a  railway  train  with  a  stage- 
coach. Many  of  the  old  instruments  have  been  vastly 
improved  ;  new  ones  have  been  invented ;  improved 
schools  of  technique  have  brought  about  that  passages 
which  once  would  have  been  entrusted  only  to  solo 
artists  are  now  written  without  hesitation  for  the  ordi- 
nary orchestral   player.      This    extension  of  orchestral 


The  Centennial  Cantata  8i 

constituents  has  been  accompanied  by  a  corresponding 
extension  of  the  province  of  orchestral  effects.  To  the 
modern  musical  composer  the  human  voice  is  simply  an 
orchestral  instrument ;  while  on  the  other  hand  each 
orchestral  instrument  has  become  a  genuine  voice  with 
its  own  peculiar  role  of  expression.  A  composer,  there- 
fore, of  the  modern  school  in  setting  words  to  music  will 
no  longer,  as  of  old,  write  a  solo  for  the  human  voice 
with  an  accompaniment  for  the  orchestra ;  but  he  will 
write  for  the  orchestra  proper,  bringing  prominently 
forward  in  his  harmonization  only  those  voices  (whether 
human  or  merely  instrumental)  whose  peculiar  expres- 
sive powers  appear  to  be  required  in  order  to  interpret 
the  conceptions  of  the  poetic  text. 

Now,  what  purely  intellectual  conceptions  (for  clearly 
not  all)  are  capable  of  such  orchestral  interpretation. 
This  question  is  intended  to  leave  wholly  untouched  the 
great  province  of  emotional  expression,  in  which  this 
author  believes  the  power  of  music  to  be  supreme  and 
unlimited.  The  inquiry,  strictly  stated,  is  now :  What 
common  ground  exists  to  conventionally  significant 
words  and  the  unconventionally  significant  tones  of  the 
modern  orchestra? 

Before  advancing  to  state  some  very  unexpected  prin- 
ciples which  will  result  from  this  inquiry,  it  is  here  neces- 
sary to  observe  that  the  attitude  of  American  criticism 
toward  a  recent  poem  of  the  author's,  known  as  the 
Centennial  Cantata  —  an  attitude  varying  between  the 
extremes  of  enthusiastic  admiration  and  brutal  abuse  — 
has  clearly  revealed  the  circumstance  that  the  fundamen- 
tal question  herein  mooted  has  not  even  occurred  to 
more  than  one  or  two  cither  of  those  who  blamed  or 
those  who  praised,  though  it  would  seem  that  not  only  a 

6 


82  Music  and  Poetry 

discussion  but  some  definite  solution  of  that  question 
must  necessarily  precede  anything  like  an  intelligent 
judgment  of  the  poem. 

It  is  necessary,  also,  to  state  one  final  consideration 
which  makes  it  the  plain  duty  of  this  author  to  begin 
that  discussion  in  person.  Much  of  this  praise  has  come 
from  the  section  in  which  he  was  born,  and  there  is  rea- 
son to  suspect  that  it  was  based  often  on  sectional  pride 
rather  than  on  any  genuine  recognition  of  those  artistic 
theories  of  which  his  poem  is  —  so  far  as  he  now  knows  — 
the  first  embodiment.  Any  triumph  of  this  sort  is  cheap 
because  wrongly  based,  and  to  an  earnest  artist  is  in- 
tolerably painful.  Here  is  a  situation  which  leaves  me 
no  resource  except  to  make  some  systematic  declaration 
of  the  principles  underlying  this  matter,  so  that  what- 
ever praise  or  blame  they  deserve  may  be  meted  out  to 
them  rather  than  to  the  wholly  immaterial  matter  of  the 
locality  of  the  author's  birth. 

1  desire,  therefore,  first  to  propound  three  principles 
which  appear  to  result  from  that  new  attitude  of  poetry 
toward  music  brought  about  by  the  modern  extension  of 
the  orchestra;  secondly,  to  verify  these  a  priori  deduc- 
tions by  facts  a  posteriori,  that  is  to  say,  by  examples  of 
the  precise  sort  of  ideas  which  have  been  actually  se- 
lected by  the  greatest  masters  of  modern  music  for  rep- 
resentation in  tone  ;  and  thirdly,  having  thus  supported 
theory  by  fact,  to  call  attention  in  the  briefest  manner 
to  the  minute  particularity  with  which  these  principles 
are  followed  out  in  the  poem  alluded  to. 

In  any  poem  offered  by  a  poet  to  a  modern  musical 
composer,  the  central  idea,  as  well  as  every  important 
subordinate  idea,  should  be  drawn  only  from  that  class 
of  intellectual  conceptions  which  is  cap^ible  of  being 


The  Centennial  Cantata  83 

adequately  expressed  by  orchestral  instruments.  The 
possibility  of  such  expression,  emerging  from  the  beauti- 
ful soul  of  Gluck,  has  come  down  to  the  modern  artist 
strengthened  by  occasional  holy  sanctions  from  Schubert 
and  Beethoven,  by  startling  confirmations  from  Berlioz 
and  Liszt  and  Saint  Sa^ns,  and  even  by  occasional 
recognitions  from  Meyerbeer  (notably  in  his  interpreta- 
tion of  a  ghost  with  the  bassoons),  and  from  Rossini  (as 
in  the  William  Tell  overture).  Finally,  the  gigantic 
illustrations  of  Richard  Wagner,  while  they  refer  more 
particularly  to  the  interpretation  of  ideas  by  tones  with 
the  additional  assistance  of  the  stage  properties  —  /.  <?., 
the  musical  drama  —  have  nevertheless  widened  the 
province  of  orchestral  effects  to  such  a  magnificent  hori- 
zon that  every  modern  musical  composer,  whether  con- 
sciously Wagnerite  or  not,  is  necessarily  surrounded  with 
a  new  atmosphere,  which  compels  him  to  write  for  the 
whole  orchestra,  and  not  for  the  human  voice  as  a  solo 
instrument  and  for  the  orchestra  as  a  subsidiary  one. 
This  principle  (a)  would  therefore  seem  to  be  self- 
evident,  inasmuch  as  every  part  of  the  text  which  does 
not  conform  to  it  is  manifestly  not  available  for  the 
musical  composer,  and  is  so  much  waste  matter  quoad 
music. 

(/y)  Inasmuch  as  only  general  conceptions  are  capable 
of  such  interpretation,  a  poem  for  (say)  a  cantata  should 
consist  of  one  general  idea,  animating  the  whole  ;  be- 
sides this,  it  should  be  composed  of  subordinate  related 
ideas ;  each  of  these  subordinate  ideas  should  be  the 
central  idea  of  a  separate  stanza,  or  movement ;  each 
stanza  should  be  boldly  contrasted  in  sentiment  with  its 
neighbor  stanzas,  in  order  to  permit  those  broad  oullmes 
of  tone-color  which  constitute   the  only  means  known 


$4  Music  and  Poetry 

to  music  for  differentiating  ideas  and  movements  from 
each  other ;  and,  finally,  the  separate  central  ideas  of 
these  subordinate  stanzas,  or  movements,  should  not  run 
into  each  other,  but  begin  and  end  abruptly. 

An  attentive  consideration  of  this  principle  (J))  will  go 
far  toward  effecting  a  complete  reversal  of  the  generally- 
received  opinion  that  a  poem  for  musical  representation 
ought  necessarily  to  be  perfectly  clear,  smooth,  and  natu- 
ral.    For  consider :  without   now   having  the   space   to 
detail  an  exhaustive  list  of  such  conceptions  as  can  be 
reproduced  in  music,  it  is  sufficient  to  say   that    those 
conceptions  are  necessarily  always  large,  always  general, 
always    abruptly  outlined  when   in   juxtaposition.      An 
illustration  drawn  from  the  art  of  painting  will  at  once 
make  this  plain.     The  illuminating  power  of  music  (if 
one  may  so  express  it)  is,  when  compared  with  that  of 
the  non-musical  inflections  of  the  human  voice   in  pro- 
nouncing words,   about  as  moonlight  when   compared 
with  sunlight.      Now  fancy  that  a  capricious  sovereign 
should  order  his  court-painter  to  execute  a  picture  which 
was  to  be  looked  at  only  by  moonlight ;  what  would  be 
the  artist's  procedure?       In   the    first  place   he   would 
choose  a  mystical  subject :  for  moonlight,  with  its  vague 
and  dreamy  suggestions,  would  be  favorable  to  its  treat- 
ment.    He  would  next  select  gigantic  figures,  for  the 
same  reason;  and  while  these  figures  would  have  to  be 
even  harshly  outlined   in  order  to  make   them   distinct, 
the  painter  would  permit  himself  indefinite  liberty  as  to 
the  background  and  as  to  the  space  between  separate 
figures,   in   order  to  fill    these  as  far   as  possible  with 
the  same  vague  and  dreamy  subtleties  appropriate  to 
moonlight. 

The  poet,  called  on  to  write  a  cantata-text  for  music. 


The  Centennial  Cantata  85 

is  precisely  in  the  position  of  a  painter  called  on  to 
paint  a  picture  for  moonlight;  and  the  author  desires 
that  this  illustration  should  be  kept  in  mind  when  he 
comes  to  show  presently  how  this  parallel  course  has 
been  followed. 

(c)  When  a  poetic  text  is  to  be  furnished  for  an 
orchestra  in  which  the  human  voices  greatly  outnumber 
the  instrumental  voices,  the  words  of  the  poem  ought  to 
be  selected  carefully  with  reference  to  such  quality  of 
tone  as  they  will  elicit  when  sung.  For  example,  when 
a  language  consists,  as  ours,  mainly  of  the  two  classes 
of  Saxon  and  Latin  derivations,  and  when  the  nature 
of  the  orchestral  effect  desired  is  that  of  a  big,  manly, 
yet  restrained  jubilation,  I  think,  the  poem  ought  to  be 
mainly  of  Saxon  words  rather  than  the  smoother-sound- 
ing Latin  forms  of  our  language.  At  any  rate,  I  tried 
this  experiment  in  the  poem  alluded  to;  and  I  shall 
presently  have  occasion  to  refer  to  the  satisfactory  result 
of  it 

Having  thus  announced  —  let  it  here  be  said,  with  all 
disclaimer  of  dogma  and  with  all  the  timidity  which 
every  pioneer  should  preserve  —  these  meagre  outlines  of 
principles,  I  come  to  the  second  part  of  my  task,  which 
is  to  verify  them  by  inquiring  which  kind  of  ideas  or 
poems  have  been  selected  by  the  greatest  musical  mas- 
ters of  modem  times  for  orchestral  representation. 

The  noblest  work  of  Berlioz  immediately  occurs,  in 
support  of  the  position  that  a  text  for  music  should  pre- 
sent gigantic  figures,  broadly  outlined  and  even  abruptly 
so  sometimes,  but  giving  backgrounds  and  spaces  of 
vagueness  which  the  artist  leaves  to  the  hearer's  im- 
agination to  fill  up ;  I  mean  the  well-known  "  Opium 
Dream  of  an  Artist,"  where  the  first  movement  presents 


86  Music  and   Poetry- 

gigantic  horrors  surrounding  the  vision  of  the  loved  one, 
the  second  contrasts  this  with  a  ballroom  scene,  the 
third  this  with  a  pastoral  scene,  the  fourth  this  with  the 
march  of  a  doomed  man  to  the  scaffold,  and  so  on. 
Passing  from  Berlioz  to  Liszt,  I  instance  the  latter's 
nobler  translation  into  music  of  Lamartine's  Mediiation 
upon  Death. 

This  immediately  suggests  the  very  striking  tone-pic- 
ture which  Saint-Saens  has  made  of  a  French  verse  de- 
scribing a  dance  of  skeletons ;  indeed,  the  first  line  of 
the  verse  itself  is  pure  gibberish,  being  only  "  Zig,  zig, 
zig." 

As  a  final  example  the  author  may  mention  that  a 
short  time  ago,  the  Peabody  orchestra,  a  band  of  forty- 
six  musicians  at  Baltimore,  directed  by  Asger  Hamerik, 
was  requested  by  Dr.  Hans  von  Biilow  to  play  for  him, 
as  a  personal  favor,  his  own  composition  called  Des 
Sanger's  Fluch  (The  Minstrel's  Curse),  being  a  tone- 
translation  of  Uhland's  poem  of  the  same  name.  Late 
in  an  afternoon  we  accordingly  met  (the  author  was  a 
member  of  that  orchestra)  in  the  hall  of  the  Peabody 
Academy,  no  one  being  present  besides  Dr.  von  Biilow, 
Mr.  Hamerik,  and  the  orchestra.  Dr.  von  Biilow 
mounted  the  stand  and  conducted  his  own  piece  with 
electric  fire,  and  of  course  with  intelligent  comprehen- 
sion. During  this  highly  advantageous  rendition  noth- 
ing could  have  been  clearer  than  the  justice  of  the 
principles  which  have  been  herein  before  announced; 
for  although  Uhland's  poem  of  the  MinsirePs  Curse 
is  a  connected  narrative,  yet  in  the  tone-rendering 
all  such  parts  of  the  poem  as  were  (what  I  may  call) 
connective  tissue,  were  simply  skipped  over  and  there 
emerged  from  the  magnificent  mass  of  tones  only  the 


The  Centennial  Cantata  87 

large  conception  of  the  two  minstrels,  the  King,  the 
Queen,  the  farewell,  the  curse,  and  so  on ;  and  these 
were  the  points  which  the  director  accentuated  in  his 
leading  of  the  band,  practically  leaving  all  else  to  his 
hearers'  imaginations. 

Without  the  space  to  multiply  these  examples,  the 
author  now  proceeds  to  the  third  and  last  part  of 
this  paper,  which  is  an  illustration  from  the  Centennial 
Cantata  itself  of  the  manner  in  which  the  foregoing 
principles  were  carried  out  in  that  poem. 

When  the  author  received  his  very  unexpected  ap- 
pointment from  the  Centennial  Commission  to  write  the 
text  for  a  cantata  which  was  to  be  interpreted  by  an 
orchestra  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  instruments  and  a 
chorus  of  eight  hundred  voices,  it  immediately  suggested 
itself  to  him  that  the  principal  matter  upon  which  the 
citizens  of  the  United  States  could  legitimately  felicitate 
themselves  at  this  time  was  the  fact  that  after  a  hundred 
years  of  the  largest  liberty  ever  enjoyed  by  mortals  they 
had  still  a  republic  unimpaired.  The  idea,  then,  of  the 
Triumph  of  the  Republic  over  the  opposing  powers  of 
nature  and  of  man  immediately  suggested  itself  as  logi- 
cally proper  to  be  the  central  idea  of  the  poem  ;  and 
inasmuch  as  the  general  idea  of  triumph  over  opposition 
is  considered  reproducible  by  well-known  orchestral 
effects,  it  was  made  at  once  tlie  logical  and  musical 
Refrain  of  the  work,  nature  and  man  shouting  several 
times,  "  No  !  thou  shalt  not  be  !  "  and  the  Land  finally 
exclaiming  in  triumph,  "  I  was,  I  am,  and  I  shall  be." 
Thus  was  satisfied  the  principle  above  marked  (a).  In 
accordance  with  principle  (d)  the  poem  was  constructed 
in  eight  different  metred  stanzas,  each  of  which  was 
informed  by  its  own  sentiment,  and  was  differentiated 


88  Music  and  Poetry 

from  its  neighbor  by  making  that  sentiment  such  as 
required  strong  musical  contrasts  as  compared  with  the 
sentiment  preceding  or  following  it.  For  example,  the 
first  stanza  of  ten  lines  was  to  be  interpreted  by  sober, 
firm,  and  measured  progressions  of  chords,  representing 
a  colossal  -figure  in  meditation.  The  next  (Mayflower) 
stanza  contrasted  this  with  an  agitato  sea  movement, 
rising  gradually  to  a  climax  with  the  shouted  Refrain, 
"  No  !  it  shall  not  be."  The  next  (Jamestown)  move- 
ment contrasted  this  with  a  cold  and  ghostly  tone-color, 
the  author  having  filled  the  stanza  with  long  e  vocables 
in  order  to  bring  out  a  certain  bassoon  quality  of  tone 
from  the  human  voices  on  the  "  thee,  thee,"  "  ye,"  and 
the  like,  and  having  made  the  stanza  itself  a  gaunt  and 
bony  one  in  metre  and  form,  to  type  the  trials  of  the 
early  colonists  as  they  rose  before  the  meditative  eye  of 
Columbia  out  of  the  weltering  sea  of  the  Past.  The 
next  (Tyranny)  stanza  contrasted  this  with  a  renewed, 
but  different,  fury  of  agitato  movement,  presenting  to  the 
musical  composer  a  lot  of  ideas  —  religious  and  political 
oppression,  war,  error,  terror,  rage,  crime,  a  windy  night, 
voices  of  land  and  sea,  and  finally  a  climacteric  shout  of 
the  Refrain,  "  No  !  thou  shalt  not  be,"  —  all  of  which  were 
easily  reproducible  in  tone  by  the  resources  of  the  modern 
orchestra;  the  next  (Huguenot)  stanza  contrasted  this 
with  a  rapid  and  somewhat  stealthy  movement  of  alter- 
nating hope  and  fear ;  the  next  brought  its  contrast  of 
the  outburst  of  Triumph  in,  "  I  was,  I  am,"  etc. ;  the 
next  offered  an  entire  contrast  in  the  Angel's  Song, 
which  I  wrote  with  the  understanding  that  Mr.  Whitney 
of  Boston  was  to  sing  it ;  and  finally  this  basso  solo  was 
contrasted  by  the  unrestrained  outburst  of  all  the  voices 
into  the  jubilation  and  welcome  of  the  last  stanza. 


The  Centennial  Cantata  89 

These  separate  characterizations  were  indicated  upon 
the  original  copy  of  the  form  sent  the  musical  composer 
by  marginal  notes  affixed  to  each  stanza ;  and  the  author 
cannot  think  it  improper  for  him  to  avail  himself  of  this 
occasion  to  acknowledge  the  intelligent  comprehension 
with  which  Mr.  Buck  seized  these  ideas  and  the  drama- 
tic fire  with  which  he  embodied  them  in  tone.  Finally, 
to  conclude  these  illustrations  drawn  from  the  Cantata 
—  the  author  desiring  to  experiment  upon  the  quality 
of  tone  given  out  by  choral  voices  when  enunciating 
Saxon  words,  as  compared  with  that  from  smoother 
Latin  derivatives,  wrote  his  poem  almost  entirely  in  the 
former.  Disregarding  their  hardness  in  reading  —  the 
poem  was  to  be  sung,  not  read  —  he  unhesitatingly  dis- 
carded smooth  Latin  derivatives  for  the  sake  of  Saxon 
ones,  being  all  the  more  decided  in  this  course  by  the 
logical  propriety  of  it.  The  result  was  a  complete  vin- 
dication. The  manner  in  which  the  short,  sharp, 
vigorous  Saxon  words  broke,  rather  than  fell,  from 
the  lips  of  the  chorus,  and  a  certain  suggestion  of  big 
manliness  produced  by  the  voices  themselves  in  enun- 
ciating these  abrupt  vocables,  will  probably  never  be 
forgotten  by  any  unprejudiced  person  who  was  in  hear- 
ing of  the  chorus  on  the  opening  day  of  the  Interna- 
tional Exhibition. 

In  closing  this  paper,  the  author  begs  to  remind  the 
reader  that  all  herein  said  of  his  cantata-text  has  refer- 
ence solely  to  its  technical  adaptability  to  musical  in- 
terpretation, and  that  when  he  had  thought  out  the 
principles  herein  announced  his  task  had  but  begun ; 
for  it  still  remained  to  evolve  out  of  these  materials  any- 
thing possessing  such  unity  as  might  entitle  it  to  the 
name   of  poem.     In  point  of  fact,  the  course  pursued 


90  Music  and   Poetry- 

was  simply  to  saturate  his  mind  with  these  ideas  and 
then  wait  for  the  poem  to  come. 

Nor  does  the  author  desire  it  to  be  considered  that 
he  indorses  all  the  claims  of  modern  music  so  far  as 
they  profess  to  include  the  genuine  reproduction  of 
pure  intellectual  conceptions  by  orchestral  tones.  In 
the  present  stage  of  his  thought,  without  daring  to  have 
a  decided  opinion  either  way,  he  simply  awaits  further 
evidence.  But  for  the  purposes  of  this  cantata-text, 
inasmuch  as  it  was  to  be  put  forth  as  representative 
—  to  the  limits  of  its  province  —  of  American  art,  the 
author  considered  that  the  doctrines  of  what  is  unques- 
tionably the  predominant  school  of  music  ought  to  be 
recognized  in  all  their  fulness. 

Which  latter  remark  enables  the  author  to  close  his 
paper  by  putting  the  following  question : 

Since,  taking  the  meanest  possible  view  of  his  cantata- 
text,  it  was  at  all  events  a  faithful  attempt  to  embody 
the  status  of  poetry  with  regard  to  the  most  advanced 
musical  thought  of  the  time,  made  upon  carefully  evolved 
laws  and  with  clear  artistic  purposes,  which  is  more 
worthy  of  his  countrymen's  acceptance,  that,  or  the  far 
other  endeavor  of  certain  newspapers  to  belittle  the 
largest  anniversary's  celebration  of  our  country  by  the 
treatment  of  one  of  its  constituent  features  in  a  manner 
which  evinced  not  only  a  profound  unconsciousness  of 
principles,  even  preliminary  to  the  possibility  of  any 
right  judgment  in  the  matter,  but  also  a  more  inexcu- 
sable disregard  for  the  proprieties  of  a  dignified  occasion 
and  for  the  laws  of  respectable  behavior? 

New  York,  May  19,  1876. 


The  Legend  of  St.   Leonor  91 


VII 

The  Legend  of  St.   Leonor 

[A  fragment  from  an  unfinished  lecture  on  "  The  Relations  of 

Poetry  and  Science."] 

The  scientific  man  is  merely  the  minister  of  poetry. 
He  is  cutting  down  the  Western  Woods  of  Time  ;  pres- 
ently poetry  will  come  there  and  make  a  city  and  gar- 
dens. This  is  always  so.  The  man  of  affairs  works 
for  the  behoof  and  use  of  poetry.  Scientific  facts  have 
never  reached  their  proper  function  until  they  merge  into 
new  poetic  relations  established  between  man  and  man, 
between  man  and  God,  or  between  man  and  Nature. 

I  think  I  can  show  you  that  this  has  been  precisely 
recognized  by  the  hard  practical  sense  of  the  common 
people  in  other  times.  I  have  called  the  man  of  sci- 
ence a  pioneer  who  cuts  down  the  Western  Woods  of  the 
Universe,  in  order  that  presently  Poetry  may  come  to 
that  spot  and  build  habitations  and  pleasances  good  for 
man.  Now  I  never  think  of  the  man  of  science  without 
comparing  him  to  one  of  those  wonderful  monks  of  the 
sixth,  seventh,  and  eighth  centuries  who  came  over  into 
the  stern  forests  of  Armorica,  bearing  religion  with  them, 
but  depending,  mark  you,  on  the  felling  of  the  forest  and 
the  cultivation  of  the  ground  as  initial  steps  in  the  con- 
version of  the  people.  And  hereby  hangs  the  legend 
which  I  wish  to  relate. 


92  Music  and   Poetry 

Once  upon  a  time  St.  Leonor,  with  sixty  disciples, 
came  to  an  inhospitable  region  at  the  mouth  of  the 
Ranee  in  Armorica,  and  settled.  Their  food  was  of  the 
rudest  description,  being  only  what  they  could  obtain 
from  the  woods  and  waters.  One  day  the  good  Bishop 
Leonor,  while  praying,  happened  to  see  a  small  bird  car- 
rying a  grain  of  wheat  in  its  beak.  He  immediately  set 
a  monk  to  watching  the  bird,  with  instructions  to  follow 
it  when  it  flew  away.  The  monk  followed  the  bird,  and 
was  led  to  a  place  in  the  forest  where  he  found  several 
stalks  of  wheat  growing.  This  was  probably  the  last  relic 
of  some  ancient  Gallo-Roman  farm.  St.  Leonor,  on 
learning  the  news,  was  overjoyed.  "  We  must  clear  the 
forest  and  cultivate  the  ground,"  he  exclaimed,  and  im- 
mediately put  the  sixty  at  work.  Now  the  work  was 
hard,  and  the  sixty  disciples  groaned  with  tribulation  as 
they  toiled  and  sweated  over  the  stubborn  oaks  and  the 
briary  underbrush.  But  when  they  came  to  plough,  the 
labor  seemed  beyond  all  human  endurance.  I  do  not 
know  how  they  ploughed ;  but  it  is  fair  to  suspect  that 
they  had  nothing  better  than  forked  branches  of  the 
gnarly  oaks  with  sharpened  points  for  ploughs,  and  as 
there  is  no  mention  of  cattle  in  the  legend,  the  presump- 
tion is  fair  that  these  good  brothers  hitched  themselves 
to  the  plough  and  pulled.  This  presumption  is  strength- 
ened by  the  circumstance  that,  in  a  short  time,  the  sixty 
rebelled  outright.  They  begged  the  Bishop  to  abandon 
agriculture  and  go  away  from  that  place.  "  Pater " 
(naively  says  the  Bollandist  recounter  of  the  legend), — 
"  Pater,"  cried  the  monks,  "  oramus  te  ut  de  loco  isto 
recedas." 

But  the  stout  old  father  would  not  recede.  No ;  we 
must  get  into  beneficial  relations  with  this  soil.     Then 


The  Legend  of  St.   Leonor  93 

the  monks  assembled  together  by  night,  and,  having 
compared  opinions,  found  it  the  sense  of  the  meeting 
that  they  should  leave  the  very  next  day,  even  at  pain  of 
the  abandonment  of  the  Bishop.  So,  next  morning,  when 
they  were  about  to  go,  behold  !  a  miracle  stopped  them  : 
twelve  magnificent  stags  marched  proudly  out  of  the 
forest  and  stood  by  the  ploughs,  as  if  inviting  the  yoke. 
The  monks  seized  the  opportunity.  They  harnessed  the 
stags,  and  these  diligently  drew  the  ploughs  all  that  day. 
When  the  day's  work  was  done,  and  the  stags  were 
loosed  from  harness,  they  retired  into  the  forest.  But 
next  morning  the  faithful  wild  creatures  again  made  their 
appearance  and  submitted  their  royal  necks  to  the  yoke. 
Five  weeks  and  three  days  did  these  animals  labor  for 
the  brethren. 

When  the  ground  was  thoroughly  prepared,  the  Bishop 
pronounced  his  blessing  upon  the  stags,  and  they  passed 
quietly  back  into  the  recesses  of  the  forest.  Then  the 
Bishop  sowed  his  wheat,  and  that  field  was  the  father  of 
a  thousand  other  wheat-fields,  and  of  a  thousand  other 
homes,  with  all  the  amenities  and  sweetnesses  which  are 
implied  in  that  ravishing  word. 

Now,  here  is  the  point  of  this  legend  in  this  place. 
Of  course,  the  twelve  stags  did  not  appear  from  the 
forest  and  plough  ;  and  yet  the  story  is  true.  The  thing 
which  actually  happened  was  that  the  Bishop  Leonor,  by 
his  intelligence,  foresight,  practical  wisdom,  and  faithful 
perseverance,  reclaimed  a  piece  of  stubborn  and  imprac- 
ticable ground,  and  made  it  good,  arable  soil.  (It  is 
also  probable  that  the  story  was  immediately  suggested 
by  the  re-taming  of  cattle  which  the  ancient  Gallo-Roman 
people  had  allowed  to  run  wild.  The  bishops  did  this 
sometimes.)     This  was  a  practical  enough  thing ;   it  is 


94  Music  and  Poetry 

being  done  every  day;  it  was  just  as  prosaic  as  any  com- 
mercial transaction.  But,  mark  you,  the  people  —  for 
this  legend  is  a  pure  product  of  the  popular  imagination 
of  Brittany  —  the  people  who  came  after  saw  how  the 
prosaic  wheat-field  of  the  Bishop  had  flowered  into  the 
poetical  happiness  of  the  rude  and  wild  inhabitants  who 
began  to  gather  about  his  wheat  patch,  and  to  plant  fields 
and  build  homes  of  their  own ;  and,  seeing  that  the  prose 
had  actually  become  thus  poetic,  the  people  (who  love 
to  tell  things  as  they  really  are,  and  in  their  deeper  rela- 
tions) the  people  have  related  it  in  terms  of  poetry. 
The  bird  and  the  stags  are  terms  of  poetry.  But,  notice 
again,  that  these  are  not  silly,  poetic  licenses ;  they  are 
not  merely  a  child's  embellishments  of  a  story ;  the  bird 
and  the  stags  are  7iot  real ;  but  they  are  true.  For  what 
do  they  mean?  They  mean  the  powers  of  Nature. 
They  mean,  as  here  inserted,  that  if  a  man  go  forth,  sure 
of  his  mission,  fervently  loving  his  fellow-men,  working 
for  their  benefit ;  if  he  adhere  to  his  mission  through 
good  and  evil  report ;  if  he  resist  all  endeavor  to  turn  him 
from  it,  and  faithfully  stand  to  his  purpose,  —  presently 
he  will  succeed ;  for  the  powers  of  Nature  will  come 
forth  out  of  the  recesses  of  the  universe  and  offer  them- 
selves as  draught-animals  to  his  plough.  The  popular 
legend  is  merely  an  affirmation  in  concrete  forms  of  this 
principle  ;  the  people,  who  are  all  poets,  know  this  truth. 
We  moderns,  indeed,  —  we  whose  practical  experiences 
beggar  the  wildest  dreams  of  antiquity,  —  have  seen  a 
wilder  (beast)  creature  than  a  stag  come  out  of  the 
woods  for  a  faithful  man.  We  have  seen  steam  come 
and  plough  the  seas  for  Fulton  ;  we  have  seen  lightning 
come  and  plough  the  wastes  of  space  for  Franklin  and 
Morse. 


Nature-Metaphors  95 


VIII 

Nature-Metaphors 

Metaphors  come  of  love  rather  than  of  thought. 
They  arise  in  the  heart  as  vapors ;  they  gather  them- 
selves together  in  the  brain  as  shapes ;  they  then 
emerge  from  lip,  from  pen,  from  brush,  from  chisel,  from 
violin,  as  full  works,  as  creations,  as  Art. 

Love  —  a  term  here  used  to  signify  the  general  under- 
lying principle  of  all  emotion,  the  to  inroKeifitvov  of  all 
passion  —  originates  metaphors  by  reason  of  its  essential 
duality.  Like  Novalis'  "Pupil,"  love  "can  see  nothing 
alone."  It  exists  upon  a  necessary  hypothesis  of  two 
parties,  one  loving  and  one  beloved.  As  between  these 
two  parties,  the  overwhelming  desire  of  love  is  always 
union.  Marriage,  indeed,  is  a  large  term.  For  all  loves, 
human,  divine,  friendly,  social,  political,  ethnical,  and 
certain  other  loves  for  which  we  have  yet  no  name,  since 
man  has  but  recently  come  into  the  full  possession  and 
exercise  of  them,  —  all  these  primarily  and  immediately 
demand  some  sort  of  union,  some  sort  of  marriage,  be- 
tween the  two  parties. 

It  is  the  last-named  kind  of  these  loves  —  the  kind 
for  which  we  have  yet  no  name  —  that  specially  concerns 
us  in  this  writing,  for  the  unions  or  marriages  produced 
by  this  kind  of  love  are  what  I  have  called  nature- 
metaphors. 


^6  Music  and   Poetry 

I  speak  of  the  love  of  man  for  physical  nature,  and  of 
that  strange  and  manifold  transfusing  of  human  nature 
into  physical  nature  which  has  developed  the  most  inter- 
esting phasis  of  modern  culture  and  which  constitutes 
the  most  striking  characteristic  of  modern  art. 

In  a  certain  sense  —  which  will  appear  in  what  follows 
—  this  humanization  of  physical  nature  is  not  only  a 
striking  but  also  a  distinctive  characteristic  of  modern  as 
opposed  to  ancient  art.  To  transfer  actions,  thoughts, 
and  feelings  to  natural  objects  and  phenomena ;  to  rep- 
resent these  as  existing  and  occurring,  if  not  consciously, 
at  least  by  the  will  and  pleasure  of  inhabiting  divinities ; 
nay,  to  completely  transform  these  so  that  they  were  re- 
cognized and  alluded  to  as  beings,  loving,  fighting,  work- 
ing, planning :  it  is  true  that  even  in  the  ancient  times 
this  was  a  quite  common  procedure  of  that  old  instinct 
in  man  which  draws  him  into  blind  love  and  reverence 
for  the  sun-risings,  the  star-gatherings,  the  seas,  the 
storms,  the  trees,  the  mountains;  and  these  old  meta- 
phors of  the  first  poets  reappear  to  us  sometimes  in  the 
strangest  guises.  We  find  them  becoming,  after  the 
lapse  of  years,  fair  religions  which  govern  the  hearts  and 
control  the  souls  of  great  peoples  for  long  ages.  Recent 
comparative  philology,  examining  the  mythologies  of 
Greece,  of  Persia,  of  Egypt,  of  India,  of  Scandinavia, 
assures  us  with  much  show  of  truth  that  these  systems 
which  once,  while  in  their  primary  purity,  commanded 
the  loving  respect  of  men,  derive  their  origin  in  great 
measure  from  stocks  of  metaphorical  names  applied  by 
the  old  poets  to  natural  objects  and  occurrences,  espe- 
cially to  the  sun  and  his  doings. 

But  nature-metaphors,  after  having  in  the  ancient  days 
played  so  important  a  part,  —  of  giving  a  faith  to  the 


Nature-Metaphors  97 

otherwise  untutored  and  uncontrollable  soul  of  the  young 
world,  —  continue  in  far  other  fashion  to  exert  their  fine 
influences  upon  men  in  these  later  days.  Yet  even  now 
the  nature- metaphor  finds  among  us  a  recognition  which, 
though  universal  and  unequivocal,  is  still  inexplicit  and 
undefined  to  such  a  degree  that  by  a  large  class  of  very 
intelligent  critics  the  reproach  of  metaphor-mongering 
has  been  cast  upon  poets  whose  hold  on  the  popular 
heart  is  impregnable.  Nor  is  this  all.  Of  the  many 
people  whose  lives  are  daily  refreshed  by  those  good 
streams  of  subjective  and  domestic  poetry  which  flow  so 
freely  of  late  days,  few  enjoy  the  pure  and  serene  delight 
of  metaphors  without  feeling  a  certain  sense  of  shame  in 
deriving  pleasure  from  what  is  explicitly  regarded  as  not 
the  highest  in  art,  or  without  endeavoring  to  find  under- 
neath the  mere  beauty  some  didactic  truth  or  wholesome 
aphorism  to  chaperone  their  young  delight,  to  protect  it 
from  light  company,  and  to  shed  dignity  upon  it.  These 
persons  cannot  free  themselves  from  the  haunting  recol- 
lection that  the  ascendant  criticism  of  the  day  regards 
nature-metaphors  rather  in  the  light  of  "  fancies,"  and 
calls  vociferously  for  something  solid  to  underlie  all  beau- 
tiful expressions  of  that  sort. 

This  inconsistency  between  our  instinctive  taste  — 
which  undoubtedly  loves  nature-metaphors  —  and  our 
critical  education  —  which  undoubtedly  is  a  little  afraid 
of  them  —  leads  one  to  go  behind  it,  and  to  inquire 
what  after  all  is  precisely  the  nature-metaphor,  how  does 
it  as  a  poetic  form  consist  with  the  modern  mo//us  of 
thought,  and  what  is  its  importance  to  the  interests  of 
modern  culture. 

It  has  been  before  remarked  that  the  metaphor  is 
always  a  union  of  two  objects.     The  nature-metaphor  is 

7 


^8  Music  and   Poetry 

a  union  of  human  nature  with  physical  nature.  Clay 
informed  with  a  soul,  this  is  a  type  of  the  nature-meta- 
phor. Man  himself  precisely  answers  these  conditions. 
Man  is  clay  informed  with  a  soul.  It  is  therefore  only  a 
seeming  stretch  of  language  to  say  that  man  is  the  first 
metaphor.  In  this  union  of  the  physical  and  the  spirit- 
ual, such  as  man  himself  presents,  there  is  a  most  taking 
sweetness,  since  the  parties  to  it  are  the  two  most  widely 
differing  forms  in  the  universe.  Matter  is  in  itself  dead. 
Traditions  prove  it  to  have  been  so  regarded  by  all  na- 
tions in  all  times.  Even  the  heathen  find  themselves 
under  the  necessity  of  inventing  deities  to  preside  over 
all  its  movements,  over  the  thunder,  over  the  growing  of 
the  grass,  over  the  moving  of  the  winds  and  seas,  over 
the  flowing  of  the  rivers.  In  all  the  mythologies  these 
things  go  on  by  virtue  of  divinities  within,  never  by  virtue 
of  themselves. 

Spirit,  on  the  other  hand,  lives,  and  by  some  name  or 
another  is  recognized  everywhere  and  at  all  times  as  the 
converse  of  matter  in  this  respect. 

When,  therefore,  these  two  come  together  and  a  beau- 
tiful One  is  formed ;  when,  that  is,  a  nature-metaphor  is 
made,  in  which  soul  gives  life  to  matter  and  matter  gives 
Antsean  solidity  to  soul,  each  complementing  the  other's 
significance,  each  meaning  the  other  in  such  will-o'-wisp 
transfigurations  as  the  mind  cannot  easily  analyse  —  one 
must  confess  that  here  is  something  more  than  a  mere 
"  frothy  fancy,"  however  light  may  be  the  apparent 
weight  of  the  ideas  employed.  One  must  see  that  each 
metaphor  of  this  kind  is  noble  by  divine  lineage,  since 
God  has  decreed  the  correlative  intersignificance  of  man 
and  man's  earth :  noble  by  long  pedigree,  since  the 
youngest  nations  of  known  time  found  their  delight  and 


Nature-Metaphors  99 

their  faith  in  the  wildest  of  metaphors,  and  since  all  the 
highest  love-songs,  the  Song  of  Solomon,  the  Gita- 
Govinda,  the  ^neid,  all,  down  to  our  most  loving  poetry 
of  to-day,  are  burdened  with  metaphoric  sweetness  ;  and 
lastly,  noble  by  virtue  of  innate  greatness  and  goodness 
and  captivating  loveliness,  for  all  men  respond  to  meta- 
phor, all  hearts  open  to  give  it  place,  and  all  souls  in 
their  inmost  confessions  acknowledge  its  power.  One 
must  believe  that  the  poet  who  has  uttered  a  beautiful 
metaphor  is  conscious  of  having  beautifully  re-created 
himself  in  petto.  Fair  Protean  Nature,  fair  Protean  Soul, 
I  have  married  you  again,  I  have  given  you  another 
honeymoon  !  —  must  be  the  happy  cry  of  the  artist. 

Essentially,  then,  the  first  of  the  questions  proposed  is 
now  answered.  Our  nature-metaphor  is  a  beautiful 
eternal  bridal  of  spirit  and  matter,  in  which  the  immor- 
tality of  the  former  gains  the/^r;;/  of  the  latter,  and  the 
form  of  the  latter  gains  the  immortality  of  the  former ; 
each  being  transfused  with  the  other  like  the  souls  of 
true  man  and  wife,  and  both  having  given  without  losing, 
and  acquired  without  taking  away. 

How,  then,  does  this  so  intrinsically  noble  form  of 
expression  consist  with  the  modern  mode  of  thought? 
And  what,  first,  is  the  modern  mode  of  thought  ? 

This  last  question  cannot  be  better  answered  than  by 
observing  the  difference  between  the  genius  of  modern 
language  and  the  genius  of  ancient  language ;  for  these 
physical  forms  of  thought  exhibit  a  very  rigid  parallelism 
with,  and  indeed  mould  themselves  by,  thought  itself. 
To  illustrate  more  moderate  differences  by  an  extreme 
one,  let  us  compare,  in  only  a  few  prominent  particulars, 
the  English  tongue  with  the  Greek. 

One  notices  at  first  view  that  the  English  performs  the 


lOO  Music  and  Poetry- 

work  —  or  more  than  the  work  —  of  the  Greek  with  far 
less  cumbersome  machinery.  In  the  Greek,  for  instance, 
one  finds,  as  regards  the  nouns,  three  methods  of  declen- 
sion, each  with  its  five  forms  of  inflection,  terminating 
differently  in  singular,  dual,  and  plural  numbers.  Three 
of  these  forms,  the  genitive,  dative,  and  accusative,  sus- 
tain complicated  relations  to  the  verbs  and  the  preposi- 
tions. The  adjectives,  in  all  their  degrees,  which  are 
themselves  of  complex  form,  have  also  their  quintuple 
inflections,  which  again  vary  among  themselves  according 
to  the  gender.  Still  more  cumbrous  complexities  pre- 
sent themselves  in  the  numerous  tense-forms,  voice- 
form,  and  mood-forms  of  the  verbs. 

Opposed  to  this,  one  finds  in  English  nouns  but  a 
single  inflection;  while  English  prepositions  and  verbs 
are  as  precise  and  as  plastic  as  Greek  prepositions  and 
verbs  aided  by  manifold  changes  of  termination. 

So  to  the  Greek  adjective,  varied  by  five  cases  differ- 
ing as  the  adjective  is  masculine,  feminine,  or  neuter, 
differing  further  as  the  adjective  is  singular,  dual,  or 
plural,  and  still  further  as  positive,  comparative,  or 
superlative,  the  English  adjective  opposes  its  form  un- 
inflected  as  to  case,  unchanged  for  gender  or  number, 
and  varying  mostly  by  simple  laws  only  for  degrees  of 
comparison. 

In  the  same  way  one  finds  that  the  English  verb 
(excluding  irregular  verbs  common  to  both  languages) 
with  a  few  simple  changes  of  form  expresses,  by  the  not 
complex  machinery  of  the  auxiliary  verbs,  all  the  shades 
of  meaning  possible  to  the  Greek  verb. 

No  less  is  the  prosodial  machinery  of  the  Greek 
language  embarrassed  by  intricacies  which  do  not  ap- 
pear in  the  English.     One  can  scarcely  imagine  a  cir- 


Nature-Metaphors  loi 

cumstance,  aside  from  fundamental  structural  harshness, 
more  unfavorable  to  melody  of  poetic  expression  than 
those  very  rules  of  rigid  "  quantity  "  which  have  been 
supposed  by  modern  insane  Grecians  to  conduce  to 
music.  An  English  poem  written  in  the  metre,  or 
rather  the  metres,  of  the  Prometheus  Bound,  would  be 
far  less  rhythmical  and  far  less  melodious  than  many 
pages  selected  at  random  from  the  prose-writings  of 
English  authors  who  could  be  named. 

When  to  all  these  complexities  of  the  Greek  tongue 
one  adds  the  varying  position  and  number  of  the  accents, 
and  the  changes  in  the  sound  of  the  same  word  pro- 
duced by  the  occurrence  of  long  or  short  vowels  in  the 
oblique  cases,  together  with  the  lawless  superposition  of 
the  accent  in  the  nominative  case,  one  cannot  fail  to 
conclude  that  the  English  has  in  a  wonderful  degree  at 
once  simplified  the  machinery  and  extended  the  possible 
range  of  language  as  a  working  instrument  in  prose  and 
as  a  singing  instrument  in  poetry. 

Now  these  characteristic  differences  between  the 
English  and  Greek  languages  will  be  found  to  be  at 
bottom  the  characteristic  differences  also  between  mod- 
ern and  ancient  thought.  The  change  from  ancient  to 
modern  modes  of  thought  and  language  is  quite  parallel 
with  and  is  well  illustrated  by  that  which  has  occurred  in 
military  tactics  and  organizations.  The  heavy  infantry 
of  only  a  few  years  ago,  with  its  straight  lines,  its  angular 
movements,  and  its  prescribed  slow  gait,  is  gone  :  in  its 
place  we  have  the  light-armed  troops  who  move  either 
in  right  lines,  curved  lines,  or  oblique  lines,  who  walk, 
trot,  run,  kneel,  lie  down,  who  load  and  fire  at  will  or 
command,  who  separate  at  five  paces  and  rally  by  fours 
or  by  regiment,  as  occasion  requires. 


I02  Music  and   Poetry 

Ancient  thouglit  was  strong :  modern  thought  has 
retained  this  strength  and  added  to  it  a  wonderful 
agiUty.  Ancient  thought  was  a  huge  Genie  :  modern 
thought  is  a  Genie  or  a  lightsome  Ariel  at  will. 

These  then  being  the  peculiarities  of  modern  thought, 
how  does  the  nature-metaphor  fulfil  the  requirements 
of  this  modern  intellectual  /nodus,  which  is  so  simple 
and  so  wide-spanning,  so  domestic  and  so  daring? 

Truly,  the  two  seem  made  for  each  other.  The  met- 
aphor by  its  very  constitution  demands  of  the  artist  the 
utmost  simplicity  of  construction,  and  rewards  the  artist 
with  the  widest  range  of  application  and  significance. 
For  instance,  the  most  meagre  description  of  Napoleon 
and  Washington  will  have  instantly  acquired,  so  far  as 
the  poetic  impression  upon  the  mind  of  the  reader  is 
concerned,  a  force  and  a  beauty  unattainable  by  any 
amount  of  detail,  when  the  writer  finishes  it  with : 
"  Napoleon  was  lightning,  Washington  was  sunlight." 
Here  in  a  simple  sextiole  of  words  are  bound  up  the 
most  prominent  characteristics  of  the  men,  to  be  un- 
folded at  the  reader's  leisure.  But  now  the  idea  of 
lightning,  though  so  conjoined  with  the  name  of  the 
great  soldier,  is  by  no  means  limited  to  this  association ; 
for  in  the  next  moment  the  poet  may  sing,  without  fear 
of  confusion,  of  the  lightning  in  a  lady's  eye,  and  so  on 
to  eternity. 

True,  however,  as  is  this  consonance  of  the  nature- 
metaphor  with  modern  intellectual  processes,  this  truth 
is  yet  not  the  gravest  one  in  this  connection,  and  does 
not  lie  at  the  root  of  the  matter.  For  —  if  one  did  not 
fear  to  write  too  much  about  love  lest  one  (alas,  the 
times  !)  be  suspected  of  lightness  —  the  question  might 
have  been  asked,  how  does  the  nature-metaphor  suit  the 


Nature- Metaphors  103 

tendency  of  modem  love,  rather  than  of  modern  thought? 
This  indeed  would  have  been  the  appropriate  inquiry ; 
for  wherever  society  locates  its  love  (that  is,  its  want, 
its  desire),  there  she  sends  intellect  to  work  in  its  ser- 
vice ;  and  if  one  wish  to  discover  whither  the  thought  of 
a  time  is  flying,  one  must  discover  first  whither  the  love 
(or  want,  or  desire)  of  the  time  has  flown. 

Now,  nothing  strikes  the  thoughtful  observer  of  mod- 
ern literature  more  quickly  or  more  forcibly  than  the 
great  yearning  therein  displayed  for  intimate  companion- 
ship with  nature.  And  this  yearning,  mark,  justifies 
itself  upon  far  other  authority  than  that  which  one  finds 
in,  for  example,  the  Greek  nature-seeking.  Granted 
the  instinctive  reverence  for  nature  common  to  both 
parties :  the  Greek  believed  the  stream  to  be  inhabited 
by  a  nymph,  and  the  stream  was  wonderful  to  him  be- 
cause of  this  nymph ;  but  the  modern  man  believes  no 
such  thing.  One  has  appeared  who  continually  cried 
love,  love,  love  —  love  God,  love  7ieighbors  ,•  and  these 
"neighbors"  have  come  to  be  not  only  men-neighbors, 
but  tree-neighbors,  river-neighbors,  star-neighbors.  The 
stream — to  carry  on  the  Greek  parallel  —  has  acquired 
so  much  individuality  independent  of  any  inhabiting 
nymph,  that  men  may  love  it,  may  be  neighbors  to  it 
and  neighbored  by  it,  and  may  live  life  with  it  in  the 
finest  harmony. 

Here,  then,  it  is  seen  how  nature,  which  before 
depended  on  mere  blind  reverence  and  on  imagined 
indwelling  deities  for  its  hold  on  man's  soul,  has  now 
become  so  far  able  to  dispense  with  these  as  to  claim  a 
genuine  love  from  man  on  its  own  individual  account. 
How  infinite  is  the  field  so  added  to  the  range  of  man's 
love  !     How  beautiful  and  iiow  numerous  the  unions  of 


I04  Music  and  Poetry 

human  emotion  and  physical  phenomena  made  possible 
in  virtue  of  this  wliolly  new  and  sweet  relation  between 
humanity  and  nature  ! 

This  way,  then,  society  has  now  sent  its  love  —  towards 
nature ;  and  the  manifold  relation  between  society  and 
nature,  demanding  expression,  finds  it  in  the  nature- 
metaphor,  and  revels  in  this  with  the  finest  and  com- 
pletest  of  satisfactions. 

It  must  be  remarked  that  one  finds  in  the  Hindu  charac- 
ter a  far  nearer  approach  to  this  modern  view  of  nature 
than  in  the  Greek  and  Roman.  Let  us  see  by  actual 
experiment  how  differently  the  hearts  of  the  Hindu, 
of  the  Roman,  and  of  the  Englishman  framed  their 
nature-metaphors.  Hear  the  poet  Jayadeva,  in  the 
Gita-  Govinda  :  — 

The  gale  that  has  wantoned  around  the  beautiful  clove-plant 
breathes  from  the  hill  of  Malaya.  .  .  . 

The  Tamala,  with  leaves  dark  and  fragrant,  claims  a  tribute 
from  the  Musk,  which  it  vanquishes.  .  .  . 

The  tender  blossom  of  the  Caruna  smiles  to  see  the  whole 
world  laying  sham  aside.  .  .  . 

The  fresh  Malica  seduces  with  rich  perfume  even  the  hearts  of 
hermits,  while  the  Amra-tree  with  blooming  tresses  is  embraced 
by  the  gay  creeper  Atimucta.  .  .  . 

Another  stands  meditating  on  the  Lotus  of  his  face.  .  .  . 

Whose  mantle  gleams  like  a  dark-blue  cloud  illumined  with 
rainbows.  .  .  . 

Lips  brilliant  and  soft  as  a  dewy  leaf.  .  .  . 

Her  face,  with  eyebrows  contracting  themselves  through  a  just 
resentment,  resembles  a  fresh  Lotus  over  which  two  black  bees 
are  fluttering.  .  .  . 

Her  face  is  like  a  water-lily  veiled  in  the  dew  of  tears.  .  .  . 

Her  sighs  are  flames  of  fire  kindled  in  a  thicket ;  herself  is  a 
timid  roe,  and  love  is  the  tiger  who  springs  on  her  like  Yama,  the 
genius  of  death.  .  .  . 

Her  eyes,  like  blue  water-lilies,  with  broken  stalks  dropping 
lucid  streams.  .  .  . 


Nature-Metaphors  105 

Long  has  she  been  heated  with  sandal-wood,  moonlight  and 
water-lilies,  with  which  others  are  cooled.  .  .  . 

Many  a  flower  points  his  extended  petals  to  pierce  the  bosoms 
of  separated  lovers.  .  .  . 

The  breeze  which  has  kissed  thy  cheek.  .  .  . 
A  mind  languid  as  a  drooping  wing,  feeble  as  a  trembling 
leaf.  .  .  . 

O  thou  who  sparkiest  like  lightning !  .  .  . 
He  is  a  blue  gem  on  the  forehead  of  the  three  worlds.  .  .  . 
Drowned  in  a  sea  of  rapturous  imaginations.  ,  .  . 
The  moon  spread  a  net  of  beams  over  the  groves  of  Vrindavan, 
and  looked  like  a  drop  of  liquid  sandal  on  the  face  of  the  sky, 
which  smiled  like  a  beautiful  damsel. 

Flowers  are  indeed  the  arrows  of  love,  and  he  plays  with  them 
cruelly.  .  .  . 

Her  face,   like   the   moon,   is  graced   with   clouds    of    dark 
hair.  .  .  . 

She  floats  on  the  waves  of  desire.  .  .  . 

He  fixes  white  blossoms  on  her  dark  locks,  where  they  gleam 
like  flashes  of  lightning  among  the  curled  clouds.  .  .  . 

Her  arms  graceful  as  the  stalks  of  the  water-lily,  and  adorned 
with  hands  glowing  like  the  petals  of  that  flower.  .  .  . 

Whose  wanton  eyes  resemble  blue  water-lilies,  agitated  by  the 
breeze.  .  .  . 

His  azure  breast  glittered  with  pearls  of  unblemished  lustre, 
like  the  full  bed  of  the  cerulean  Yamuna  interspersed  with  curls 
of  white  foam.  .  .  . 
Liquid  bliss.  .  .  . 
The  fire  of  separation.  .  .  . 

These  are  nearly  all  the  metaphorical  expressions  in 
the  Gita-Goinnda. 

Hear  now  the  Hindu's  opposite,  Virgil.  One  will 
notice  in  passing  how  the  multitudinous  imagery  of  the 
Hindu,  devoted  to  some  phase  of  love,  is  contrasted 
with  the  monotonous  figures  of  the  Roman  used  for  the 
same  purpose.  These  are  mostly  variations  of  some  idea 
connected  with  fire  :  it  is  always  urit  ("she  burns"), 
amore  incensus   ("inflamed  with  love")  ;   this,  too,  in 


io6  Music  and   Poetry 

spite  of  the  fact  that  Virgil  approaches  nearer  the  pas- 
sion-unfolding poets  of  later  days  than  most  ancient 
writers.  The  following  are  nearly  all  the  metaphorical 
expressions  in  the  first  two  hundred  lines  of  the  Fourth 
Book  of  the  yEneid,  in  which  book  it  might  be  sup- 
posed that  the  climax  of  Dido's  hot  indecision  would 
be  revealed  in  the  strongest  forms  of  expression  known 
to  the  poet.  These  strongest  forms  are  almost  always 
nature-metaphors.  The  translation  is,  of  course,  for  such 
a  purpose,  literal : 

She  fosters  the  wound  in  her  veins,  and  is  consumed  with 
hidden  fire. 

The  following  Aurora  was  lighting  the  lands  with  Phoebean 
lamp,  and  had  removed  the  humid  shadow  from  the  sky. 

Tossed  [factatus]  by  the  fates  {sc.  as  by  the  waves  of  the  sea]. 

I  recognize  the  marks  of  the  old  flame  [of  love]. 

But  would  that  the  earth  might  gape  for  me  to  the  bottom, 
would  that  the  omnipotent  father  might  hurl  me  with  lightning  to 
the  shades,  the  pallid  shades,  of  Erebus  and  to  profound  night. 

O  dearer  to  thy  sister  than  life  {luce,  light]  shalt  thou  alone, 
sad,  through  thy  whole  youth  be  wasted  [carpire:  be  plucked,  as 
a  flower  which  therefore  dies]. 

With  these  words  she  inflamed  a  soul  already  burning  with  love. 

Winter  and  watery  Orion  grew  fierce  upon  the  sea. 

Meanwhile  the  soft  flame  eats  her  marrow. 

Unhappy  Dido  burns As  an  arrow-pierced  doe  among 

the  woods  of  Crete,  whom  incautious  some  pursuing  shepherd 
has  shot  and  ignorantly  left  wounded,  wanders  in  flight  through 
woods  and  groves  Dictaean. 

The  obscure  moon  by  turns  conceals  her  light  and  the  setting 
stars  invite  sleep. 

When  to-morrow's  sun  [Titan]  shall  have  netted  the  earth  with 

his  beams. 

Meantime,  the  Morning,  arising,  left  the  ocean. 

First  Tellus  and  Juno,  the  marriage-goddess,  give  sign :  light- 
nings glittered,  and  the  air  conscious  of  the  nuptials,  and  from  the 
summit  of  the  peak  chanted  the  nymphs. 

Inflames  his  mind  with  words. 


Nature-Metaphors  107 

And  now  the  master.  How  he  makes  all  nature  alive 
in  The  Tempest!  — 

Blow  [addressing  the  storm]  till  thou  burst  thy  wind, 
if  room  enough ! 

Beats.  —  Vou  do  assist  the  storm. 

Gon.  —  Nay,  good,  be  patient. 

Boats.  —  When  the  sea  is.  Hence  !  What  care  these  roarers 
for  the  name  of  King  ? 

He  '11  be  hanged  yet,  though  every  drop  of  water  swear  against 
it,  and  gape  at  wid'st  to  glut  him. 

The  sky,  it  seems,  would  pour  down  stinking  pitch, 
But  that  the  sea,  mounting  to  the  welkin's  cheek, 
Dashes  the  fire  out. 

The  very  minute  bids  thee  ope  thine  ear. 

He  was 
The  ivy  which  had  hid  my  princely  trunk 
And  sucked  the  verdure  out  on't. 

I'  the  dead  of  darkness. 

To  cry  to  the  sea  that  roared  to  us :  to  sigh 
To  the  winds,  whose  pity,  sighing  back  again, 
Did  us  but  loving  wrong. 

Our  sea-sorrow. 

In  the  veins  o'  the  earth. 

His  bold  waves. 

It  was  mine  art 

That  made  gape 

The  pine,  and  let  thee  out. 

I  will  rend  an  oak 

And  peg  thee  in  his  knotty  entrails. 

Wicked  dew. 

Come  unto  these  yellow  sands. 
And  there  take  hands. 
Curtsied  when  you  have,  and  kissed 
( The  wild  waves  whist), 


io8  Music  and   Poetry 


Foot  it  featly  here  and  there, 
And,  rweet  sprites,  the  burden  bear. 
Hark,  hark  ! 

[Burden]        Bowgh,  wowgh, 

The  watch-dogs  bark. 
[Burden]         Bowgh,  wowgh. 

I/ark  !  hark !  I  hear 

The  strain  of  strutting  Chanticlere 

Cry  Cock-a-doodle-doo. 

Most  sure,  the  goddess 
On  whom  these  airs  attend. 

Mine  eyes,  ne'er  since  at  ebb. 

I  saw  him  beat  the  surges  under  him 

And  ride  upon  their  backs:  he  trod  the  water 

Whose  enmity  he  flung  aside  : 

.  .  .  his  bold  head 
'Bove  the  contentious  waves,  and  oared 
Himself  with  his  good  arms  in  lusty  stroke 
To  the  shore  that  o'er  his  wave-worn  basis  bow'd. 
As  stooping  to  relieve  him. 

It  is  foul  weather  in  us  all,  good  sir, 
When  you  are  cloudy. 

That  from  Naples 

Can  have  no  note  unless  the  sun  were  post 

(The  man  in  the  moon's  too  slow). 

'T  is  fresh  morning  with  me 
When  you  are  by  at  night. 

Whom  destiny  .  .  . 
The  never  surfeited  sea, 
Hath  cause  to  belch  up. 

Exposed  unto  the  sea,  which  hath  requit  it. 
Him  and  his  innocent  child. 

For  which  foul  deed 
The  powers  .  .  .  have 
Incensed  the  seas  and  shores. 

The  billows  spoke  and  told  me  of  it : 
The  winds  did  sing  it  to  me. 


Nature-Metaphors  109 

Night,  kept  chained  below. 

Virgin  snow. 

Thy  banks  with  peonied  and  lilied  brims, 
Which  spungy  April  at  thy  hest  betrims. 

Spring  come  to  you  at  farthest 
In  the  very  hand  of  harvest. 

They  smote  the  air 

For  breathing  in  their  faces ;  beat  the  ground 

For  kissing  of  their  feet. 

His  tears  ran  down  his  beard  like  winter's  drops 
.       From  eaves  of  reeds. 

Called  forth  the  mutinous  winds, 

And  'twixt  the  green  sea  and  the  azure  vault 

Set  roaring  war. 

And  as  the  morning  steals  upon  the  night, 
Melting  the  darkness,  so  their  rising  senses 
Begin  to  chase  the  ignorant  fumes  that  mantle 
Their  clearer  reason. 

Though  the  seas  threaten,  they  are  merciful. 

These  specimens  of  nature-metaphors  exhibit  very 
clearly  the  differing  relations  of  the  ancient  and  of  the 
modern  poet  to  nature.  The  ancient  is  rigorously  re- 
stricted in  his  use  of  those  rich  materials  which  nature 
affords  for  the  expression  of  beauty  and  passion.  He  is  not 
only  restricted  in  the  use,  but  in  the  material  itself :  nature 
does  not  furnish  so  much  to  him  as  to  his  later  brother. 
At  best,  nature  comes  to  him  in  the  person  of  the  deities 
and  half-deities  which  inhabit  it ;  these  divinities  have 
each  an  appointed  office  and  a  conventional  significance, 
and  to  these  pre-appointmcnts  and  conventionalities  he 
is  limited  in  his  employment  of  nature  for  poetic  pur- 
poses. '1  has,  when  Virgil  has  brought  Dido  and  yEneas 
to  the  same  cave  on  the  mountain-side,  with  the  instinct 


no  Music  and  Poetry 

of  a  poet  he  makes  resort  to  nature  for  the  purpose  of 
strengthening  and  heightening  the  cHmactcric  situation. 
He  cites  TcUus,  and  pronuba  Juno,  and  igiies  and  con- 
scius  ^Ether,  and  the  ululating  nymphs.  But  how  limited 
his  use  of  these  !  \Vhat  an  intense  climax  of  human 
passion,  long  fought  against,  now  conquering,  brought  to 
reach  of  its  burning  satisfaction  amid  rain-rivers  rushing 
from  the  mountains  {riiunt  aitmes  de  montidus),  cloud 
with  hail  intermingled  {co?nf}iixta  gratidifie  ntmbits),  and 
all  those  fearful  accessories  of  the  storm  which  beat  out 
the  outer  world  and  for  the  time  annihilate  the  whole 
universe  except  these  two  passionate  hearts  that  now 
come  together  for  the  first  time  !  How  gloriously  might 
this  have  been  told  by  a  modern  poet,  to  whom  nature, 
instead  of  being  a  few  rigidly-defined  personalities,  means 
all  things,  and  helps  him  to  say  all  things,  according  only 
as  his  soul  has  power  to  grasp  and  wield  what  is  offered 
him. 

In  the  Hindu  poet  one  finds  nature  a  little  more 
freed  from  constraint,  yet  still  limited.  The  principal 
parts  she  plays  are  mostly  drawn  either  from  love  or  from 
war,  and  only  the  most  prominent  characteristics  of  natu- 
ral objects  —  such  as  the  foam  of  the  water,  the  color 
and  shape  of  the  leaf  and  the  flower,  and  the  like  —  are 
employed.  Here  are  none  of  those  inexhaustible  re- 
sources which  lie  in  such  details  of  natural  appearances 
as,  although  less  prominent,  are  yet  quickly  recalled  to 
the  recollection  of  the  most  cursory  observer  of  nature. 
In  George  Eliot's  Spatiish  Gypsy,  for  instance,  the  suc- 
cessive gradations  of  light  in  a  Spanish  sunset  are  made 
to  do  noble  work ;  each  changing  tint,  from  the  glitter  of 
the  first  glories  to  the  gray  twilight,  comes  thronged  with 
mar\'ellous-sweet   images   and   meanings   to   which   the 


Nature-Metaphors  1 1 1 

ancient  poet  was  a  stranger.  The  ancient  poet  would 
have  dismissed  the  sunset  as  a  single  scene,  —  a  glory 
which  subsided  and  was  not. 

And  this  brings  us  to  the  Tempest  images,  in  which  one 
sees  nature  still  personal,  it  is  true,  but  so  far  from  being 
definitely  personified,  nature  is  here  one  person,  or  all 
persons,  or  any  person,  or  any  passionate  phase  of  any 
person.  And  herein  lies  the  gist  of  the  matter.  Nature 
is  like  music.  The  meanings  of  the  tones  are  not  —  as 
in  language  —  preconcerted  among  men ;  each  tone  is 
free  to  mean  all  things,  depending  on  its  situation ;  nay, 
further,  each  hearing  soul  may  translate  the  same  tone 
differently  for  itself,  may  bend  the  music  to  its  own  par- 
ticular need,  as  the  humor  strikes.  And  so  with  nature. 
Its  objects  and  its  phenomena  are  at  the  will  and  pleasure 
of  the  poet,  to  be  informed  with  whatever  spiritual  phasis 
he  may  choose  to  perpetuate.  No  caprice  of  the  poet's 
but  he  may  find  some  nature-form  to  put  it  in. 

And  this,  of  caprice,  introduces  another  peculiarity  of 
the  modern  nature-metaphor  as  opposed  to  the  ancient. 
In  regarding  these  peculiarities,  especially  as  exhibited 
by  our  greatest  poets,  one  cannot  help  being  struck  with 
such  forms  of  expression  as  occur  in  the  song  above 
quoted  from  The  Tempest.  Ariel  is  singing  to  the  sprites, 
while  he  hovers  over  Ferdinand's  head  : 

"Come  unto  these  yellow  sands, 
And  then  take  hands. 
Curtsied  wlien  you  ha%'e,  and  kissed 
(The  wild  waves  whist), 
Foot  it  fcatly  here  and  there, 
And,  sweet  sprites,  tlio  burden  bear. 
Hark,  hark!" 

—  and  suddenly,  by  an  apparently  immeasurable  and  un- 
accountable transition  of  thought,  occurs  — 


112  Music  and  Poetry 

"  Bowgh,  wowgh, 
The  watch-dogs  bark, 

Howgh,  wowgh, 
Hark  I  hark  1  I  hear 
The  strain  of  strutting  Chanticlere 
Cry,  Cock-a-doodle-doo." 

Now  —  and  this  is  far  from  being  Shakspere-worship, 
since  many  similar  instances  are  adducible  out  of  other 
writers  —  surely  no  delicately-tuned  poetic  soul  but  must 
find  in  this  bizarre  introduction  of  watch- dog  and 
chanticlere  a  rare  exquisite  pleasure.  The  secret  of  this 
pleasure,  however,  and  the  principle  upon  which  the  ap- 
parently so  irrelevant  idea  of  watch- dogs  and  crowing 
cocks  is  thrust  into  a  song  of  sprites,  are  not  so  easy  to 
discover.  It  is  under  the  impression  that  these  are  gen- 
uine metaphorical  expressions,  in  which  the  link  between 
the  primary  and  the  conferred  significations  is  refera- 
ble to  intangible  and  quickly- vanishing  trains  of  thought, 
that  they  are  cited  in  this  place.  For  this  impression 
strong  grounds  are  not  wanting.  Who  that  has  gazed 
upon  a  barking  dog  has  not  had  come  over  him  some- 
what of  that  evanescent  out-world  sensation  which  arises 
when  one  (for  instance)  repeats  a  familiar  word  many 
times  until  it  grows  unfamiliar  and  wholly  mysterious? 
Who  has  not  begun  to  dream  of  the  weird  powers  of  na- 
ture that  float,  rather  in  suggestion  than  in  person,  in  the 
strange  eye  of  the  animal  ?  Who  has  not  shivered  at  the 
evil  secrets  which  seem  to  dwell  in  the  red-rimmed  eye  of 
the  crowing  cock,  secrets  which  somehow  seem  to  link 
themselves  on  the  one  hand  with  that  wild  moment  in 
which  a  cock  announced  to  the  unseen  ears  of  the 
thronged  night  the  treachery  of  Peter,  and  on  the  other 
hand  with  those  fascinating  tales  which  among  all  nations 


Nature-Metaphors  113 

reveal  a  suspicion  of  inner  meanings  in  animal-cries,  — 
such,  for  instance,  as  the  tale  of  the  female  magicians  in 
the  Arabian  Nights,  who  learn  the  language  of  animals  and 
gather  strange  news  and  prophecies  from  them?  This 
—  if  indeed  my  words  convey  any  trace  of  those  ideas 
which  are  so  intangible  that  they  cannot  be  directly  im- 
parted but  only  chance-awakened  by  some  happy  sugges- 
tion —  is  the  co7if erred  meaning  which,  in  the  song 
alluded  to,  gives  to  the  ideas  of  dog  and  cock  their  meta- 
phorical character. 

Such  instances  are  not  found  in  the  ancient  poets. 
They  require  a  delicacy  of  organization  both  in  writer 
and  reader  not  likely  to  be  found  in  earlier  ages  than 
this.  In  old  poets  one  finds  rather  strength  than  deli- 
cacy, rather  power  than  beauty.  And  this  is  the  order 
of  nature.  In  art,  as  in  all  things,  Jupiter  conquers  Sa- 
turn, beauty  supplants  strength ;  or  —  a  better  fable  — 
strength  dies  and  is  born  again  as  beauty. 

If  we  come  now,  in  accordance  with  the  procedure 
suggested,  to  inquire  lastly  what  is  the  importance  of  the 
nature-metaphor  to  the  interests  of  modern  culture,  we 
are,  it  is  hoped,  already  prepared  to  declare  that  it  is 
great,  almost  transcendant.  In  spite  of  the  cries  of 
distressed  theologians  who  dream  that  their  large  cities 
constitute  the  world,  and  who  proclaim  with  much  lamen- 
tation that  the  said  world  is  given  over  to  materialism,  the 
open-eyed  observer  of  our  era  must  decide  that  all  those 
important  institutions  of  society  which  depend  for  their 
well-being  on  spiritual  strength  and  knowledge  and  loving 
sympathy,  are  now  far  in  advance  of  the  best  olden  times. 
Any  one  who  will  compare  the  idea  of  marriage,  for  in- 
stance, as  developed  in  Plato's  Repuhlic,  with  the  idea  of 
marriage  as  developed  in  Tennyson's  Princess,  will  sat- 

8 


114  Music  and  Poetry 

isfy  himself  on  this  point.  The  age  which  proceeded 
on  Plato's  idea  must  have  been  at  bottom  a  barbarous  age, 
no  matter  what  products  of  intellectual  culture  may  have 
sprung  from  it.  The  age,  on  the  other  hand,  in  which 
Tennyson's  idea  is  so  universally  diffused  that  no  penny-a- 
hner  in  the  country  newspapers  but  turns  it  daily  into  in- 
tolerable verse,  must  be  a  hopeful  age,  no  matter  what 
vices  flaunt  in  its  avenues.  Indeed,  the  cries  of  theolo- 
gians in  favor  of  idealism  are  based  upon  a  mistaken  no- 
tion, and  are  full  of  a  harm  which  it  will  be  the  province 
of  our  nature-metaphors  in  some  measure  to  counteract. 
For  idealism,  as  a  sole  theory  of  life,  is  no  better  than 
materialism,  and  each  is  bad  if  dissociated  from  the  other. 
Why  shall  men  sunder  the  spirit  of  man  from  nature, 
which  God  hath  joined  together?  The  soul  and  the 
body  work,  in  harmony  well,  in  enmity  ill.  The  meta- 
phoric  "  flesh  "  of  Scripture,  which  is  to  be  mortified,  has 
not  stronger  reference  to  the  body  than  to  the  soul ;  for  as 
many  of  the  sins  comprehended  under  that  term  are  spirit- 
ual as  are  physical,  and  are  so  enumerated  in  the  Bible. 

This  harmonious  union  of  soul  and  body,  of  spirit  and 
nature,  of  essence  and  form,  is  promoted  by  the  nature- 
metaphor,  which  reveals  with  wonderful  force  how  these 
two,  united  from  of  old,  still  have  new  points  of  sweet 
and  thrilling  contact,  and  still  adorn  and  complement 
each  other.  Spirit  needs  form,  and  finds  it  in  nature, 
which  is  formal ;  nature  needs  life,  and  finds  it  in  spirit, 
which  is  life-giving.  Never  be  these  two  sundered  !  For- 
ever may  the  nature-metaphor  stand  a  mild  priest,  and 
marry  them,  and  marry  them,  and  marry  them  again,  and 
loose  them  to  the  free  air  as  mated  doves  that  nestle  and 
build  and  bring  forth  mildnesses  and  meeknesses  and 
Christ-loves  in  men's  hearts ! 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  115 


IX 

A  Forgotten  English  Poet 

It  is  not  only  from  our  environment  in  space  that  our 
thoughts  and  tastes  take  on  that  illogical  bent  called 
provincialism.  There  is  a  parallel  process  whereby  our 
minds  become  unreasonably  prejudiced  against  things 
which  are  foreign,  not  to  our  country,  but  to  our  era, 
and  from  which  we  estimate  our  distance  in  years  rather 
than  in  miles.  Every  wise  traveller  knows  how,  upon 
reaching  a  new  country,  he  is  compelled  to  make  a  thor- 
ough readjustment  of  himself  in  order  to  arrive  at  sound 
conclusions  with  regard  to  many  matters  which  are  apt 
to  seem  outrageous  simply  because  they  are  unfamiliar. 
In  the  same  way  he  who  journeys  back  through  time 
to  read  a  poem  written  long  ago,  must  make  quite  sure 
that  he  seems  no  more  grotesque  to  the  poem  than  the 
poem  seems  to  him.  There  is  a  provincialism  of  the 
period  as  well  as  of  the  parish  ;  and  it  is  interesting  to 
observe  that  those  who  have  thoroughly  emancipated 
themselves  from  the  latter  are  often  found  to  betray  un- 
mistakable symptoms  of  the  former.  It  is  curious  to 
note  how  different  is  the  influence  which  the  civilization 
of  steam  has  exerted  upon  the  provincialism  of  the  parish 
from  the  influence  which  it  has  excited  on  the  provincial- 
ism of  the  period.  It  may  be  said  of  the  civilized  world 
in  general  that  the  "outlandish"  is  a  much  less  potent 


ii6  Music  and  Poetry 

factor  in  opinion  since  we  have  learned  to  be  shy  of  pro- 
nouncing all  things  absolutely  grotesque  which  are  only 
relatively  unfamiliar.  But  this  very  enlargement  from 
the  restraint  of  the  parish  boundary  which  has  come  to 
us  along  with  an  increased  facihty  of  travel  has  plumped 
us  into  the  middle  of  the  new  with  such  suddenness  that 
we  seem  immeasurably  removed  from  the  pre-locomotive 
past.  Thus,  while  we  have  ceased  to  find  amusement  or 
offence  in  that  which  is  foreign,  many  of  us  are  still  in  the 
bonds  of  a  very  rigid  provincialism  as  to  that  which  is 
old.  Steam  has  carried  us  nearer  to  our  brethren,  but 
farther  from  our  ancestors. 

The  necessity  of  struggling  against  this  state  of  mind, 
and  of  resolutely  chasing  from  our  door  that  stupid  Cer- 
berus of  prepossession  which  scares  so  many  pleasures 
away  from  narrow  souls,  is  particularly  strong  when  the 
reader  of  to-day  is  first  appealed  to  by  the  English  son- 
net of  the  sixteenth  century.     The  sonnet  itself,  at  the 
outset,  simply  as  a  form  of  verse,  comes  at  a  disadvan- 
tage :  it  seems  too  rigidly  specialized  to  a  mind  which 
rejoices  in  a  general  sense  of  possession  of  the  whole 
universe  and  is  constitutionally  averse  to  precise  patterns 
and  methods.     Further,  as  to  the  substance  of  these  old 
English  sonnets,  most  readers  have  a  vague  preconcep- 
tion that  they  are  a  sort  of  thing  really  hardly  worth  the 
attention  of  an  earnest  person,  a  mass  of  strained  device 
and  a  string  of  toys,  altogether  too  idle  for  this  realistic 
generation.     It  cannot  be  denied  that  such  a  precon- 
ception  legitimately   arises  from   the   perusal    of  many 
of  the  current  slim  octavo  manuals  of  English  literature 
which  so  many  of  us  dutifully  study  at  our  schools,  and 
thereafter  pass  through  life  with  a  certain  comfortable 
sense  of  being  well  acquainted  with  the  movement  of  the 


A  Forgotten  English   Poet  117 

English  mind  since  Csedmon.  The  work  of  the  EngUsh 
sonnet-makers  of  the  sixteenth  century  —  a  work  which 
is  the  glory  of  our  tongue  and  the  endless  delight  of 
those  who  really  know  it  — is  too  often  perfunctorily 
dismissed  in  these  ill-assorted  collections  and  imperfect 
treatises  as  little  more  than  a  bundle  of  conceits,  or  at 
best  as  a  kind  of  formal  old  garden  of  ideas  clipped  into 
shapes  of  impossible  griffins  and  absurd  lovers. 

"Conceits,"  of  course,  abound;  but  they  must  be 
handled  very  carefully.  All  poetry  is  made  up  of  "  con- 
ceits," in  the  good  sense  of  the  phrase ;  and  the  bound- 
ary-line between  the  good  sense  and  the  bad  sense  must 
be  pushed  energetically  and  liberally  outward  by  the 
reader  in  bringing  the  artistic  work  of  a  period  three 
hundred  years  past  into  a  fair  relation  with  our  own 
time.  What  would  be  intolerably  fantastic  now  was  not 
so  then,  and  will  not  be  so  to  him  who  largely  makes  his 
now  a  then,  in  order  to  get  at  the  heart  of  all  this  beauty. 
Shakspere  in  trunk  hose  and  slashed  doublet  would 
cut  a  very  preposterous  figure  sauntering  down  Broadway 
these  frosty  mornings,  yet  not  more  so  than  one  of  our 
merchants  in  surtout  and  overshoes  walking  soberly  along 
the  Fleet  in  the  days  of  Elizabeth. 

It  behoves  us  to  remember  and  to  appreciate  that 
these  sonnet-makers  belong  to,  and  many  of  them  are 
important  characters  in,  a  time  of  superlatively  energetic 
and  daring  men;  a  time  of  good  honest  flesh  and  of 
very  red  blood ;  a  time  that  ventured  forth  over  the  un- 
known seas,  dared  the  cannibal,  searched  the  four  corners 
of  the  earth,  colonized,  conquered,  thought  profoundly, 
fought  gallantly,  and  in  many  ways  furnished  the  world 
with  strong  fibre.  These  were  not  the  men  to  create  a 
dandy  time  nor  to  pet  a  dandy  poetry.     Sonnets  which 


ii8  Music  and  Poetry 

pleased  Raleigh  and  Essex,  Burleigh  and  Bacon,  cannot 
be  despised  as  a  trifling  collection  of  "  conceits." 

The  sonnets  may  be  clipped  shrubs  and  of  grotesque 
shapes,  if  so  please  the  provincialism  of  the  nineteenth 
century ;  but  would  you  only  stay  a  minute  you  will  hear 
a  bird  in  every  bush. 

No  figure  could  better  describe  that  particular  son- 
neteer whom  the  present  paper  will  occupy  itself  with 
bringing  before  the  reader.  Bartholomew  Griffin  is,  in 
fact,  only  a  name  which  we  connect  with  a  certain  sweet 
song  that  comes  to  us,  like  that  of  a  hidden  bird,  out  of 
the  very  thickest  clump  of  obscurity.  A  single  copy  of 
his  original  work  exists  in  the  Bodleian  Library.  The 
title-page  is  inscribed  to 

"  FiDESSA,  MORE 

CHASTE   THEN 

KINDE 


By  B.  Griffin,  gent. 

Printed  by  the 

widdow  Orwinfor 

Matthew  Lownes 

1596." 

and  the  dedication 

"To  the  Most  Kinde  and  Vertuous  gentleman,  Mr.  William 
Essex  of  Lamebourne  in  the  countie  of  Barke  Esquire"  — 

consists  of  a  few  modest  and  simple  sentences,  depre- 
cating its  liberty,  and  finally  saying : 

"  Daign  (Sweete  Sir)  to  pardon  the  matter,  judge  favorably 
of  the  manner,  and  accept  both :  so  shall  I  ever  rest  yours  in 
all  dewtifuU  affection. 

"  Yours  ever,  B.  Griffin." 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  119 

Several  years  ago,  Dr.  Phillip  Bliss  —  a  man  held  in 
loving  remembrance  by  all  students  of  English  poetry  — 
laid  the  world  under  obligation  by  printing  a  hundred 
copies  of  this  Bodleian  volume ;  and  recently  the  Rev. 
A.  J.  Grosart  has  given  forth  an  edition  of  fifty  copies, 
to  subscribers  only,  in  which  some  errors  of  the  former 
edition  are  corrected  and  several  critical  notes  are  added. 
But  in  spite  of  many  assiduous  inquiries  set  on  foot  by 
Bliss  and  Grosart,  absolutely  nothing  can  be  learned  of 
our  poet's  personal  history.  Who  he  was,  and  who  Fi- 
dessa  was,  except  that  the  latter  is  referred  to  in  one  of 
the  sonnets  as 

"  Sweet  modell  of  thy  far -renowned  Sire," 

is  all  blank.  From  an  old  local  chronicle  there  does 
emerge  the  meagre  circumstance  that  on  the  3d  of  April, 
1582,  a  certain  Bartholomew  Griffin  obtained  a  license 
from  John,  Bishop  of  Worcester,  to  eat  meat  in  Lent ; 
but  this  cannot  be  considered  satisfactory  to  the  loving 
searcher,  even  if  we  had  any  assurance  that  the  luxury 
of  this  dispensation  was  enjoyed  by  our  sonneteer.  After 
all  this  research,  therefore,  it  must  be  acknowledged  that 
the  one  hundred  and  fifty-one  copies  just  specified,  each 
containing  its  sixty-two  sonnets  to  Fidessa,  constitute  at 
present  the  entire  acquaintance  existing  between  the 
world  and  Bartholomew  Griffin. 

Yet  if  it  be  indeed  worth  while  to  be  remembered  in 
one's  personal  history  by  fiiture  generations,  a  different 
fate  from  that  which  has  befallen  him  was  deserved  by 
young  Griffin  —  since  young  he  evidently  was  when  he 
wrote.  For  in  him  there  certainly  were  many  qualities 
precious  even  when  single,  much  more  so  in  combina- 
tion, and  which  abundantly  entitle  his  pathetic  praises 


I20  Music  and  Poetry 

of  Fidessa  to  take  their  place  in  our  regard  beside  the 
Avioretti  of  Spenser,  the  Ideas  of  Drayton,  the  Sonnets 
of  Daniel  to  Delia,  of  Sidney  to  Stella,  of  William  Drum- 
mond  to  his  short-lived  lady,  of  Raleigh  and  of  Con- 
stable, not  to  speak  of  Nicholas  Breton,  the  Vauxs,  the 
Fletchers,  Warner,  Peele,  Greene,  Watson,  Lodge,  Barn- 
field,  Nicholson,  and  that  ilk,  all  of  whom  may  be  found 
duly  named,  at  least,  in  many  of  the  current  histories  of 
English  literature  which  yet  omit  all  mention  of  Grififin. 
It  is  now  proper  to  give  the  reader  some  taste  of  the 
qualities  thus  generally  referred  to.  In  the  first  place,  no 
unbiassed  reader  can  fail  to  be  struck,  at  first  view  of 
Griffin's  handiwork,  by  the  remarkable  ease  with  which 
our  English  idioms  run  into  the  mould  of  the  sonnet.^ 
A  very  general  but  also  very  vague  impression  is  abroad 
that  our  language  is  somehow  incompatible  with  the  son- 
net, which  is  regarded  as  at  best  a  form  of  poetry 
imported  and  alien,  a  sort  of  tour  de  force  or  exercise  of 
technical  skill.  Such  an  impression  is  certainly  a  naive 
proof  of  our  singular  lack  of  acquaintance,  at  first  hand, 
with  the  work  of  our  poets.  Every  one  is  familiar  with 
the  process  by  which,  when  we  hear  day  after  day  the 
name  of  some  one  whom  we  have  never  seen,  we  uncon- 
sciously construct  a  physiognomy  and  general  shape  in 
our  minds  with  which  we  associate  the  name ;  and  every 
one  knows  how  it  always  happens  that  when  the  individ- 
ual thus  bodied  forth  by  our  fancy  comes  to  be  actually 
beheld,  the  first  exclamation  is,  How  different  you  are 
from  what  I  had  pictured  !     It  is  much  in  this  way  that 

^  The  "  English  "  sonnet  —  as  distinguished  from  the  stricter 
form  now  generally  called  the  Italian,  or  Legitimate,  sonnet — is 
here  meant ;  though  the  remark  may  be  sustained  as  to  both  forms 
without  difiSculty. 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  I2i 

many  of  us  believe  ourselves  to  be  familiar  with  English 
literature,  because  our  manuals  have  made  us  familiar 
with  certain  well-known  names.  But  if,  at  any  time, 
good  fortune  leads  us  actually  to  read  the  works  of  these 
writers,  we  are  at  once  amazed  at  the  completeness  of 
our  previous  ignorance  and  enchanted  by  the  depth  of 
our  new  delight.  To  our  astonishment,  we  may  then  dis- 
cover that  the  sonnet,  instead  of  being  a  verbal  toy,  is 
the  very  primitive  art-form  of  the  modern  Englishman ; 
and  if  we  pursue  the  subject  we  presently  know  that,  for 
the  last  three  hundred  years,  whenever  an  English  poet 
has  had  any  peculiarly  holy,  private,  and  personal  emo- 
tion to  give  forth  in  the  poetic  way,  he  has  usually  chosen 
the  sonnet  form  for  this  purpose.  After  Caedmon  wrote 
Saxon  English,  and  Chaucer,  Norman  English,  when  we 
come  to  Wyat  and  Surrey  and  the  stricter  Elizabethans, 
we  see  modem  English  poetry  springing  into  being  in 
the  form  of  the  sonnet.  It  is  of  no  great  moment  that 
the  form  had  existed  before  in  Italy.  The  notion  that 
sonnets  are  foreign  and  merely  dilettante  forms  of  Eng- 
lish poetry  is  a  mere  argument  of  the  neglect  with  which 
many  of  the  most  artistic  users  of  our  tongue  have  been 
treated.  We  can  understand  and  forgive  Ben  Jonson, 
when  he  declared  in  his  big,  frank,  blundering  way  to 
William  Drummond  that  the  sonnet  was  a  Procrustean 
bed  for  ideas.  Jonson  spoke  from  small  experience,  not 
then  being  able  to  look  —  as  we  can  —  from  the  vanish- 
ing standpoint  which  commands  these  last  wonderful 
three  hundred  years.  Had  he  even  fully  known  the  very 
man  to  whom  he  was  talking,  he  could  not  have  said 
what  he  did.  Some  of  Drummond's  sonnets  are  —  one 
must  use  the  word  —  simply  adorable  ;  and  if  this  sounds 
extravagant  there  are  "  Be  as  thou  wast,  my  Lute,"  and 


122  Music  and  Poetry 

"  Dear  Quirister  who  from  these  shadows  sends,"  and 
twenty  more,  to  speak  for  themselves  in  such  wise  as  no 
man  may  gainsay.  We  can  only  forgive  Jonson  because 
he  knew  them  not ;  but  the  ignorance,  which  was  a  good 
plea  in  his  mouth,  will  not  avail  in  face  of  the  sweet  irre- 
sistible multitude  of  English  sonnets  which  have  been 
printed  since  1590.  What,  for  example  —  before  pro- 
ceeding to  specify  other  qualities  peculiar  to  Griffin's 
work  —  could  be  more  simple,  more  direct,  more  like 
thoughts  uttering  themselves  without  the  aid  of  culture 
and  without  the  sense  of  criticism,  than  the  following 
sonnet  to  Fidessa?  The  poor  young  lover,  fearful  of 
being  consumed  in  an  unrewarded  passion,  speaks  his 
fear  with  as  little  circumlocution  as  a  child  asking  for 
water  or  a  ploughman  calling  to  his  horse.  In  every  word, 
collocation,  turn  of  phrase,  sentence,  and  idiom,  the 
English  ear  will  recognize  its  own  ;  it  is  so  straightfor- 
ward as  to  form  a  communication,  unobjectionable  from 
the  scriptural  point  of  view,  being  but  yea,  yea,  and  nay, 
nay,  yet  it  is,  though  by  no  means  Griffin's  best,  very 
good  music,  and  makes  one  think  of  a  blue-eyed  child 
singing  about  death  :  — 

"The  sillie  bird  that  hasts  unto  the  net 

And  flutters  to  and  fro  till  she  be  taken 
Doth  looke  some  foode  or  succour  there  to  get, 

But  looseth  life,  so  much  is  she  mistaken  ; 
The  foolish  flie  that  flieth  to  the  flame 

With  ceaseless  hovering,  and  with  restless  Alight, 
Is  burned  straight  to  ashes  in  the  same 

And  finds  her  death  where  was  her  most  delight; 
The  proud  aspiring  boye  that  needs  would  prie 

Into  the  secrets  of  the  highest  seate 
And  some  conceite  to  gain  contente  thereby, 

Or  else  his  follie  sure  was  wondrous  great, 
There  did  through  follie  perish  all  and  die, 
And  (though  I  know  it)  even  so  doe  I." 


A   Forgotten  English  Poet  123 

No  experienced  craftsman  in  words  will  fail  to  per- 
ceive that  the  limpid  transparency  of  these  sentences 
is  not  a  happy  accident,  but  an  achievement  of  delib- 
erate art ;  for  it  is  supported  by  too  many  other  beauties 
which  would  also  have  to  be  considered  results  of  acci- 
dent, namely,  by  the  exquisite  variations  in  the  sequences 
of  vowel  sounds,  the  perfect  anastomosis  of  terminal 
letter  with  initial  letter,  the  light  and  delicate  use  of 
alliteration,  not  only  to  mottle  the  prevalent  rhythm, 
but  to  intensify  a  logical  antithesis,  and  other  technical 
particulars. 

Again,  in  Griffin's  sonnets,  the  beginning  has  always 
an  eye  to  the  end.  Each  intermediate  circumstance, 
too,  has  a  convergent  direction  by  which,  at  last,  all 
meet,  substantially,  in  a  keen  and  effective  point,  like 
the  incidents  which  form  the  plot  of  every  well-con- 
ducted story  or  drama.  Indeed,  every  good  sonnet  is 
a  drama ;  and  the  critical  reader  need  desire  no  more 
perfect  test  for  the  hidden  art  of  a  sonnet  than  the  com- 
pleteness with  which  it  answers  to  the  requirements  of 
dramatic  unity.  True,  the  whole  sonnet  is  but  a  short 
soliloquy ;  nevertheless  it  must  have  its  due  beginning, 
its  convergent  plot,  and  its  crisis  in  the  last  lines.  In 
the  following  sonnet,  for  instance,  the  general  dramatic 
type  is  artfully  varied  by  keeping  in  suspense  the  nature 
of  the  crisis  through  a  number  of  incidental  particulars 
bearing  on  it  only  in  the  one  point  of  time  : 

"So  soonc  as  peeping  Lucifer,  Aurora's  starre,^ 
The  skic  with  golden  pcrcings  doth  spangle, 

J  It  is  difficult  to  tell  whether  the  redundancy  of  syllables  in 
this  line  is  an  oversight,  or  intended  to  be  made  up  by  such  a 
rai)id  utterance  of  the  word  "Lucifer"  as  to  give  all  three  of  its 
syllables  the  value  of  one  short  in  the  iambus  with  "  Au."  It  is 
most  probably  the  oversight  of  an  evidently  young  writer. 


124  Music  and  Poetry 

So  soone  as  Phoebus  gives  us  light  from  farre, 

So  soone  as  fowler  doth  the  bird  untangle, 
Soone  as  the  watchtuU  birde  (clocke  of  the  morne) 

Gives  intimation  of  the  dayes  appearing, 
Soone  as  the  joUie  Hunter  windes  his  home, 

His  speech  and  voyce  with  customs  Eccho  clearing, 
Soone  as  the  hungrie  Lion  seekes  his  praie, 

In  solitary  range  of  pathles  mountaines, 
Soone  as  the  passenger  sets  on  his  waie, 

So  soone  as  beastes  resort  unto  the  fountaines ; 
So  soone  mine  eyes  their  office  are  discharging, 
And  I  my  griefes  with  greater  griefes  inlarging." 

Or,  note  the  same  suspension  carried  on  through  thir- 
teen lines,  with  the  quaint  intensification  of  pathetic 
hopelessness  wrought  by  the  "  and  I  not  be,"  of  the  thir- 
teenth, to  the  last  line,  which,  by  a  perfect  feeling  for 
art,  is  made,  together  with  the  thirteenth,  a  foot  shorter 
than  the  others. 

"  When  never-speaking  silence  proves  a  wonder, 

When  ever-flying  fame  at  home  remaineth, 
When  all-concealing  night  kcepes  darknes  under, 

When  men-devouring  wrong  true  glorie  gaineth, 
When  soule-tormenting  griefe  agrees  with  joy, 

When  Lucifer  forerunneth  baleful  night, 
When  Venus  doth  forsake  her  little  boye. 

When  her  untoward  boye  attaineth  sight, 
When  Sysiphus  doth  cease  to  roule  his  stone, 

When  Othes  shaketh  off  his  heavie  chaines, 
When  Beautie  Queene  of  pleasure  is  alone. 

When  Love  and  Vertue  quiet  peace  disdaines, 
When  these  shall  be,  and  I  not  be, 
Then  will  Fidessa  pitie  me." 

Again,  besides  this  faculty  of  rounding  the  sonnet 
into  a  dramatic  whole.  Griffin  has  a  certain  bright  viva- 
city which  is  constantly  presenting  the  reader  with 
charming  surprises  by  suddenly  changing  the  statuesque 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  125 

dramatis  personce.  of  a  demure  tableau  into  actual  and 
active  people.  For  example,  in  this  sonnet  on  Sleep  — 
to  which  the  reader's  attention  is  asked  on  other  ac- 
counts which  will  be  specified  presently  —  the  sudden 
and  vivid  introduction  of  the  figures  of  Fidessa  and  of 
Sleep,  in  active  underplay,  cuts  delightfully  in  upon  the 
drowsy  sonnet,  and  gives  real  character  to  the  last  line, 
which  is  as  artless  as  the  earnest  quest  of  the  child  ask- 
ing its  mother  when  will  Santa  Claus  come  again. 

"  Care-charmer  sleepe,  Sweete  ease  in  restless  miserie,i 

The  captive's  libertie  and  his  freedome's  song  ; 
Balm  of  the  bruised  heart,  man's  chief  felicitie ; 

Brother  of  quiet  death,  when  life  is  too,  too  long ; 
A  Comedie  it  is,  and  now  an  Historie. 

What  is  not  sleepe  unto  the  feeble  minde  ? 
It  easeth  him  that  toyles  and  him  that 's  sorrie; 

It  makes  the  deafe  to  hear,  to  see  the  blinde. 
Ungentle  sleepe,  thou  helpest  all  but  me. 

For  when  I  sleepe  my  soule  is  vexed  most. 
It  is  Fidessa  that  doth  master  thee  ; 

If  she  approach  (alas)  thy  power  is  lost. 
But  here  she  is  :  see  how  he  runnnes  amaine ; 
I  fear  at  night  he  will  not  come  againe." 

The  treatment  of  the  same  subject  by  several  authors 
always  affords  an  interesting  method  of  bringing  their 
individual  characteristics  into  clear  relief.  This  is  par- 
ticularly the  case  when  they  have  not  only  treated  the 
same  subject,  but  treated  it  in  the  same  special  form. 
It  so  happens  that  three  of  Griffin's  contemporaries  — 
Daniel,  Urummond,  and  Sir  Philip  Sidney  —  also  wrote 

1  It  is  impossible  not  to  believe  that  this  line,  and  the  three 
immediately  succcedinii  the  next  were  purposely  made  Alexan- 
drines for  the  sake  of  length  and  drowsiness  ;  as  the  two  last  lines 
of  the  sonnet  just  previously  ([uotcd  were  shortened  in  order  to 
gain  a  certain  abrupt  strength  and  point. 


126  Music  and  Poetry 

sonnets  on  sleep,  and  it  will  therefore  help  the  reader 
toward  a  distinct  idea  of  our  poet's  mental  personality  to 
repeat  here  the  sonnets  of  these  three  for  the  sake  of 
comparison. 

Consider  first  Sir  Philip  Sidney's,  which,  take  it  for  all 
in  all,  is  much  the  best  specimen  of  his  poetic  handi- 
work now  in  existence.  Note  —  and  truly  who  that  has 
ever  spent  a  sleepless  night  can  fail  to  note  ?  —  the 
keeping  and  harmonious  collocation  of  the  smooth  pil- 
lows, the  sweetest  bed,  the  chamber  deaf  to  noise  and 
blind  to  light,  the  rosy  garland,  and  the  weary  head. 
Then  the  turn  of  thought  in  which  he  attempts  to  bribe 
Sleep,  other  inducements  failing,  by  promising  him,  if 
he  will  come,  to  show  him  the  best  picture  of  Stella  that 
ever  was  taken,  to  wit,  the  picture  graven  in  his  own 
lover's  heart  —  with  the  necessarily  inferred  compliment 
that  no  god  can  hold  out  against  that  heavenly  prospect 
—  is  altogether  cunning  and  graceful.  In  these  respects, 
and  in  the  pith  and  point  of  the  introductory  items,  it  is 
finer  than  Griffin's ;  while  the  latter,  on  the  other  hand, 
greatly  excels  in  musical  flow  and  in  dramatic  vivacity. 

"  Come  sleep,  O  sleep,  the  certain  knot  of  peace, 

The  baiting-place  of  wit,  the  balm  of  woe, 
The  poor  man's  wealth,  the  prisoner's  release, 

The  indifferent  judge  between  the  high  and  low. 
With  shield  of  proof  shield  me  from  out  the  prease* 

Of  those  fierce  darts  Despair  at  me  doth  throw: 
Oh  make  in  me  those  civil  wars  to  cease : 

I  will  good  tribute  pay,  if  thou  do  so. 
Take  thou  of  me  smooth  pillows,  sweetest  bed, 

A  chamber  deaf  to  noise  and  blind  to  light, 
A  rosy  garland  and  a  weary  head  : 

And  if  these  things,  as  being  thine  by  right, 
Move  not  thy  heavy  grace,  thou  shalt  in  me 
Livelier  than  elsewhere  Stella's  image  see." 

^  i.  e.,  press,  throng. 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  127 

Sidney  appears  to  have  written  under  the  disadvantage 
of  a  notable  lack  of  the  musical  sense.  Many  of  his 
sonnets,  filled  with  exquisite  conceptions,  nevertheless 
come  as  gratingly  upon  the  ear  —  to  use  a  favorite  simile 
among  musicians  —  as  broken  crockery  falling  down- 
stairs. Thus,  as  was  said,  his  sonnet  is  inferior  to  Grif- 
fin's in  all  that  makes  music.  But  compare  the  two  with 
the  following,  also  on  Sleep,  by  Samuel  Daniel.  In  a 
certain  tender  swing  of  movement,  attained  by  great  art 
in  the  selection  of  words  presenting  sounds  upon  which 
the  tongue  and  ear  can  linger,  and  which  at  the  same 
time  suavely  melt  into  each  other  with  the  true  liquid 
flow  of  genuine  poetic  sequences,  Daniel  must  be  es- 
teemed the  greatest  English  artist.  While  the  following 
sonnet  does  not  show  him  at  his  best  in  this  respect, 
—  not  so  well,  for  example,  as  "  Let  others  sing  of 
Knights  and  Palladines,"  which  is  well-nigh  the  best 
music  ever  made  with  English  words,  —  it  is  yet  suf- 
ficiently beautiful,  and  serves  well  to  individualize  him 
in  the  reader's  mind,  as  distinguished  from  Griffin  and 
Sidney. 

"  Care-charmer  Sleepe,  Sonne  of  the  sable  night, 

Brother  to  death,  in  silent  darkness  born, 
Relieve  my  languish  and  restore  the  light ; 

With  dark  forgetting  of  my  care,  returne. 
And  let  the  day  be  time  enough  to  mourne 

The  shipwracke  of  my  ili-adventred  youth  : 
Let  waking  eyes  suffice  to  waile  their  scorn 

Without  the  torment  of  the  night's  untruth. 
Cease  dreamcs,  the  Images  of  day  desires 

To  model!  forth  the  famous  of  to-morrow: 
Never  let  rising  sunne  approve  you  liers, 

To  add  more  griefe  to  aggravate  my  sorrow. 
Still  let  me  sleepe,  imbracing  clouds  in  vaine, 
And  never  wake  to  feel  the  day's  disdain." 


128  Music  and  Poetry 

Here  one  immediately  perceives  a  cast  of  thought 
still  beautiful  but  strikingly  different  from  that  of  either 
Sidney  or  Griffin.  The  absolute  agreement  between  the 
conception  and  its  embodiment — between  idea  and 
word  —  is  finer  than  in  either  of  the  two  latter.  No 
man  ever  more  completely  identified  spiritual  cadences 
with  physical  than  does  Daniel;  the  soul  of  his  music 
presides  with  absolute  control  over  its  body,  and  the  result 
is  a  poem  in  which  the  logical  arrangement  is  the  pre- 
cise analogue  of  the  prosodial,  so  that  to  criticise  the 
thought  is  to  scan  the  verse.  The  tone  of  tender  plead- 
ing which  is  Daniel's  favorite  genre  —  and  which  is  so 
loyal  and  manly  withal  that  we  wonder  continually  how 
Delia  could  have  held  out  so  long  against  it  —  forms  a 
well-marked  characteristic  for  his  sonnets  as  opposed  to 
the  more  strongly-colored  and  more  vigorous  scenes  of 
Griffin. 

The  epithet  "  care-charmer,"  with  which  both  Griffin 
and  Daniel  begin  their  sonnets,  is  probably  not  a  plagiar- 
ism ;  and  the  same  may  be  said  of  the  other  similar 
thoughts  which  occur  in  this  quartet  of  poems,  all  treat- 
ing of  the  same  subject.  There  is  nothing  suspicious  in 
such  likenesses  ;  the  thought  is  natural,  and  suggests  itself 
too  readily  to  appear  to  be  stolen.  Plagiarism  was  not 
much  thought  of  in  those  simpler  days.  The  frequent 
occurrence  of  the  same  ideas  and  the  same  expressions 
in  poets  of  the  period  is  evidence  of  nothing  else  than 
the  free  use  of  materials  regarded  on  all  sides  as  com- 
mon stock.  Shakspere  takes  a  play  bodily,  without 
hesitation,  and  uses  its  plot  for  a  new  drama.  Ben 
Jonson  paraphrases  "  Drink  to  me  only  with  thine  eyes," 
from  the  Greek.  Wyat,  and  the  anonymous  writers  in 
the  early  collections  freely  appropriate  from  the  Italian. 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  129 

Nay,  long  before  them,  Chaucer  had  made  translations 
upon  all  sides,  and  had  never  dreamed  of  crime  in 
stamping  his  name  upon  the  wares  which  he  had  thus 
fused  and  moulded  over  again.  That  men  are  more 
scrupulous  in  these  days  may  be  a  sign  of  the  general 
clarification  of  conscience.  It  is,  at  least,  a  develop- 
ment of  men's  conceptions  of  truthfulness  which  has 
been  in  great  part  occasioned  by  the  growing  spirit  of 
exactness  in  all  things  which  increases  with  each  new 
generation. 

It  is  not  so  much  that  the  literary  men  of  our  earlier 
period  borrowed  from  each  other,  as  that  they  were  not 
so  careful  either  to  acknowledge  obligations  or  to  elim- 
inate real  or  apparent  foreign  matter  from  their  work. 
This  the  modern  writer  is  certainly  more  solicitous  in 
doing  than  has  ever  been  the  case  before ;  it  does  not, 
however,  prove  that  he  is  honest  and  the  Elizabethan  a 
thief,  but  only  that  the  general  conception  of  honesty 
has  advanced  in  point  of  definiteness  and  of  delicacy. 

Upon  these  considerations,  as  was  said,  the  charges  of 
plagiarism,  as  against  men  like  Daniel  and  his  fellows,  are 
merely  fitted  to  waste  the  time  of  pottering  antiquarians 
in  whom  all  sense  of  pure  beauty  has  long  ago  decayed, 
only  to  be  replaced  by  a  heartless  desire  to  find  what 
some  one  else  has  not  found,  without  reference  to  any 
intrinsic  value  in  the  fact  discovered. 

Without  therefore  lingering  to  ascertain  whether 
Griffin  was  debtor  to  Daniel  in  the  item  of  this  epithet 
"care-charmer,"  or  whether  any  of  these  poets  borrowed 
from  the  other  the  notion  of  Sleep  as  the  brother  of 
Death  —  a  common  legacy  indeed  out  of  the  classic 
times —  let  us  now  compare  with  the  three  sonnets  already 
given  a  fourth  one  on  Sleep  by  William  Drummond,  of 

9 


ijo  Music  and   Poetry 

Hawthorndcn.  The  different  treatment  is  readily  ob- 
served. I'he  whole  tone  here  is  grayer  and  soberer; 
and  in  the  previous  three  there  is  nothing  like 

"...  With  that  face 
To  inward  light  which  thou  art  wont  to  show  " 

of  the  ninth  and  tenth  lines,  which  contains  a  wonderful 
and  subtle  summing  up  of  the  strange  introversion  by 
which  in  dreams  our  senses  change  their  whole  direction 
of  activity,  making  themselves  dead  to  that  world  which 
lies  without  the  body,  and  alive  to  that  which  is  within 
it ;  while  the  terminal  line  rises  to  a  point  of  profound 
sublimity. 

"  Sleep,  Silence'  Child,  sweet  father  of  soft  rest, 
Prince  whose  approach  peace  to  all  mortals  brings, 
Indifferent  host  to  shepherds  and  to  kings, 
Sole  comforter  of  minds  which  are  opprest; 
Lo,  by  thy  charming-rod  all  breathing  things 
Lie  slumbering  with  forgetfulness  possest, 
And  yet  o'er  me  to  spread  thy  drowsy  wings 
Thou  spar'st  (alas)  who  cannot  be  thy  guest. 
Since  I  am  thine,  oh  come,  hut  with  that  face 
To  inward  light  which  thou  art  wont  to  show; 
With  fained  solace  ease  a  true-felt  woe  ; 
Or  if,  deaf  god,  thou  do  deny  that  grace. 
Come  as  thou  wilt,  and,  what  thou  wilt,  bequeath, 
I  long  to  kiss  the  image  of  my  death." 

In  contrast  with  this  measured  and  sombre  march,  the 
liveliness  of  Griffin's  pace  becomes  very  clearly  marked, 
while  at  the  same  time  his  child-like  naivety  and  sim- 
plicity are  in  strong  contrast  with  the  sedate  maturity  of 
Drummond's  thought. 

It  remains  to  notice  a  very  engaging  characteristic  of 
Griffin's  work,  which  gives  him  a  special  claim  to  atten- 
tion.     This  displays  itself   in   certain   of  his   sonnets, 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  131 

wherein,  mingled  with  the  extravagance  of  the  despairing 
lover's  cries,  is  a  roguish  consciousness  of  that  extrava- 
gance plainly  to  be  seen  peeping  forth  at  intervals  so  as 
to  make  a  sort  of  interplay  between  the  real  pathos  and 
the  real  absurdity  of  the  situation.  Sometimes  a  deli- 
cately-shaded variation  of  this  interplay  occurs,  most 
easily  perhaps  to  be  described  by  the  comparison  of  a 
bright  young  girl  in  amateur  tableaux  playing  Hagar  in 
the  Wilderness,  counterfeiting  intelligently  enough  the 
desolate  woman,  save  that  a  certain  arch-twinkle  in  the 
eye  will  break  out  from  an  underlying  sense  of  the  ridic- 
ulous in  the  whole  situation. 

For  example,  take  the  forty-eighth  sonnet,  wherein, 
apparently,  after  some  quite  intolerable  cruelty  on  the 
part  of  coy  Fidessa,  the  lover  rushes  off  and  relieves 
himself  in  lines  which  play  hide-and-seek  betwixt  jest 
and  earnest  until  the  last  two  lines  are  reached,  when 
suddenly  we  come  upon  a  sentiment  at  once  Roman  in 
scope  and  thoroughly  Elizabethan  in  pith  and  epigram- 
matic keenness.  Fancy  Fidessa  frowning  on  him ; 
"  Murder  !  "  he  cries  : 

"  Murder,  oh,  murder !    T  can  crie  no  longer  : 

Murder,  oh,  murder  !  is  there  none  to  ayde  me  ? 
Life  feeble  is  in  force,  death  is  much  stronger : 

Then  let  me  dye,  that  shame  may  not  upbrayde  me, 
Nothing  is  left  me  now  but  shame  or  death. 

I  fcare  she  fcareth  not  foul  murther's  guilt, 
Nor  doe  I  fcare  to  loose  a  servile  breath  ; 

I  know  my  blood  was  given  to  be  spilt. 
What  is  this  life  but  maze  of  countless  strayes, 

The  cncmie  of  true  fclicilic  : 
Fitly  compared  to  dreames,  to  flowers,  to  playes? 

O  life,  no  life  to  me  but  miserie ! 
Of  shame  or  death,  if  thou  must  one, 

Make  choice  of  death,  and  both  arc  gone." 


132  Music  and  Poetry 

Again,  he  makes  a  comical  kind  of  refrain  for  a  son- 
net out  of  tlie  word  "  more  "  —  after  a  fashion  in  vogue 
at  that  time  for  constructing  a  poem  which  should  turn 
upon  some  verbal  pivot  —  and  pours  forth  a  sort  of  jolly 
lamentation  as  follows  : 

LX. 

"  Oh  let  me  sigh,  weepe,  waile,  and  crye  no  more ; 
Or  let  me  sigh,  weepe,  waile,  cry  more  and  more; 
Yea,  let  me  sigh,  weepe,  waile,  crie  evermore ; 
For  she  doth  pitie  my  complaints  no  more 
Than  cruell  Pagan,  or  the  savadge  Moore  : 
But  still  doth  add  unto  my  torments  more, 
Which  grievous  are  to  me  by  so  much  more 
As  she  inflicts  them  and  doth  wish  them  more. 
Oh  let  thy  mercie  (mercilesse)  be  never  more! 
So  shall  sweet  death  to  me  be  welcome  more 
Than  is  to  hungrie  beastes  the  grassie  moore. 
Ah,  she  that  to  affliction  adds  yet  more 
Becomes  more  cruell  by  still  adding  more, 
Wearie  am  I  to  speak  of  this  word  (more). 
Yet  never  wearie  she  to  plaugue  me  more." 

He  throws  in  a  preposterous  touch,  to  increase  the 
damnable  iteration  of  his  torments,  by  tacking  on  a 
supernumerary  line  and  making  the  sonnet  consist  of 
fifteen  instead  of  the  regulation  number  of  fourteen 
lines. 

He  can  write,  however,  in  good  earnest,  and  can  find 
expression  for  true  and  profound  passion.  Instance  the 
following,  where  the  observant  reader  will  note  also  that 
there  is  absolutely  no  sprinkling  of  random  adjectives, 
but  that  every  least  word  materially  increases  the  weight 
of  thought  and  tends  straight  towards  the  mark  set  up  in 
the  last  two  lines : 


A  Forgotten   English  Poet  133 


XLIX. 

"  My  cruell  fortunes  clowded  with  a  frowne, 

Lurke  in  the  bosom  of  eternall  night : 
My  climing  thoughts  are  basely  haled  down, 

My  best  devices  prove  but  after-sight. 
Poore  outcast  of  the  world's  exiled  roome, 

I  live  in  wildernesse  of  deep  lament : 
No  hope  reserv'd  me  but  a  hopeless  tombe, 

When  fruitles  life  and  fruitful!  woes  are  spent. 
Shall  Phoebus  hinder  little  starres  to  shine, 

Or  loftie  Cedar  Mushroome  leave  to  grow  ? 
Sure  mightie  men  at  little  ones  repine, 

The  riche  is  to  the  poore  a  common  foe. 
Fidessa,  seing  how  the  world  doth  goe, 
Joyeth  with  fortune  in  my  overthrow." 

In  the  following  sonnet  Griffin  shows  a  meditative 
sympathy  with  the  lower  forms  of  nature  which  brings 
to  us  very  delightfully  the  fresh  scent  of  the  sixteenth 
century.  Every  one  will  be  reminded,  by  the  first  line, 
of  the  "  Wee  timorous  cowerin'  beastie,"  which  Robert 
Burns  stirred  up  in  the  field.  The  last  two  lines  also 
exhibit  a  happy  application  of  the  belief  that  death 
brings  us  an  opening  of  the  eyes  whereby  we  shall  see 
all  things,  very  different  in  its  quiet  resignation  from  the 
frantic  and  half  absurd  cries  of  some  of  the  other 
sonnets. 

XXVII. 

"Poore  worms,  poore  sillie  worme,  (alas,  poor  beast) 

Feare  makes  thee  hide  thy  head  within  the  ground, 
Because  of  creeping  things  thou  art  the  least, 

Yet  every  foot  gives  thee  thy  mortall  wound. 
But  I,  thy  fcllow-wormc,  am  in  worse  state, 

¥oT  thou  thy  Sunne  cnjoyest,  but  I  want  mine  : 
I  live  in  irksome  night :  O  cruel  fate  I 

My  sunne  will  never  rise,  nor  over  shine. 


Ij4  Music  and   Poetry 

Thus  blind  of  light,  mine  eyes  misguide  my  feete, 
And  balcfull  darkncs  makes  me  still  afraide  : 

Men  mocke  me  when  I  stumble  in  the  streete, 
And  wonder  how  my  yong  sight  so  decaied. 

Yet  doe  I  joy  in  this  (even  when  I  fall) 

That  I  shall  see  againe,  and  then  see  all." 


It  will,  too,  probably  be  inferred,  from  the  dismal  Iiue 
of  the  sonnets  so  far  given,  that  Fidessa  was  a  relentless 
coquette,  a  man-devourer  without  mercy  ;  wherefore  we 
feel  in  honesty  bound  to  redeem  this  young  person's 
character  from  such  a  stigma,  by  showing  unmistaka- 
ble hints,  occurring  here  and  there,  and  indicating  that 
when  occasion  served  she  could  come  out  sweetly 
enough  as  a  true  woman  and  helpful  soul  in  time  of 
trouble.  There  is  a  very  grateful  sonnet,  written  after 
an  illness  during  which,  to  his  heavenly  delight,  she  had 
been  good  enough  !  —  alas  that  Fidessas  of  the  nine- 
teenth century  eschew  so  lovely  a  custom  !  —  to  nurse 
him;  and  there  is  other  evidence  that  the  "cruelty" 
which  occasions  most  of  the  sonnets  is  little  more  than 
that  uprising  of  maidenhood  which  appears  to  be  a  sort 
of  prudential  arrangement  of  nature  whereby  the  weaker 
sex  instinctively  holds  off  the  stronger  for  a  time,  at 
least  long  enough  for  reflecting  upon  the  attractive 
slavery  before  irrevocably  submitting  to  it.  In  fact,  one 
finds  in  Fidessa  not  only  a  young  maiden  of  great 
discretion,  but  detects  occasional  manifestations  of  a 
prudence  which  may  sometimes  have  passed  into  prig- 
gishness,  if  we  may  be  allowed  to  use  so  unpoetical  a 
phrase  concerning  the  heroine  of  a  whole  volume  of 
sonnets.  What  is  more  interesting,  the  priggishness 
seems  very  modern  in  type.  For  example,  the  writer 
knew  some  while  ago  a  maiden  —  and  one  of  the  bright- 


A  Forgotten  English  Poet  135 

est  of  the  time  in  heart  and  mind  —  who  for  some 
months  was  quite  seriously  possessed  with  the  following 
idea  :  //  was  impossible,  she  would  declare,  with  a  very 
pretty  fervor  and  modesty,  and  with  some  show  of  de- 
spair, that  she  could  ever  love  a  man  who  loved  her, 
because  forsooth  she  knew  her  own  worth  to  be  so  small 
that  she  could  not  admire  a  man  with  a  soul  little  enough 
to  prize  it ! 

Quite  a  distinct  trace  of  similar  young  woman's  logic 
displays  itself  in  sonnet  number  XX.  Here  we  find  that 
Fidessa  has  acknowledged  herself  captive,  and  sings : 

"  Delightful  tunes  of  love,  of  true  love," 
and  so  on ;  but  presently  declares,  with  much   of  the 
involved  self-depreciation   of  the   lady  just   described, 

that 

"  Her  love  is  counsaile  that  I  should  not  love, 
But  upon  virtues  fixe  a  staled  mind," 

all  of  which  new-fangled  doctrine  of  Fidessa's  very 
rightly  and  justly  astonishes  her  downright  lover,  and 
he  exclaims : 

"  But  what  ?  this  new-coyn'd  love,  love  doth  reprove. 
If  this  l)e  love  of  which  you  make  such  store. 
Sweet,  love  me  lesse,  that  you  may  love  me  more." 


136  Music  and  Poetry 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth 

A  Study  in  Anglo-Saxon  Poetry 

Surely  it  is  time  our  popular  culture  were  cited  into 
the  presence  of  the  Fathers.  That  we  have  forgotten 
their  works  is  in  itself  matter  of  mere  impiety  which 
many  practical  persons  would  consider  themselves  en- 
titled to  dismiss  as  a  purely  sentimental  crime ;  but  ig- 
norance of  their  ways  goes  to  the  very  root  of  growth. 

I  count  it  a  circumstance  so  wonderful  as  to  merit 
some  preliminary  setting  forth  here,  that  with  regard  to 
the  first  seven  hundred  years  of  our  poetry  we  English- 
speaking  people  appear  never  to  have  confirmed  our- 
selves unto  ourselves.  While  we  often  please  our  vanity 
with  remarking  the  outcrop  of  Anglo-Saxon  blood  in  our 
modern  physical  achievements,  there  is  certainly  little  in 
our  present  art  of  words  to  show  a  literary  lineage  run- 
ning back  to  the  same  ancestry.  Of  course  it  is  always  ad- 
mitted that  there  was  an  English  poetry  as  old  to  Chaucer 
as  Chaucer  is  to  us ;  but  it  is  admitted  with  a  certain  in- 
conclusive and  amateur  vagueness  removing  it  out  of  the 
rank  of  facts  which  involve  grave  and  important  duties. 
We  can  neither  deny  the  fact  nor  the  strangeness  of  it, 
that  the  English  poetry  written  between  the  time  of 
Aldhelm  and  Caedmon  in  the  seventh  century  and  that  of 
Chaucer  in  the  fourteenth  century  has  never  yet  taken  its 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  137 

place  by  the  hearths  and  in  the  hearts  of  the  people  whose 
strongest  prayers  are  couched  in  its  idioms.  It  is  not 
found  in  the  tatters  of  use,  on  the  floors  of  our  children's 
playrooms  ;  there  are  no  illuminated  boy's  editions  of  it ; 
it  is  not  on  the  booksellers'  counters  at  Christmas ;  it  is 
not  studied  in  our  common  schools ;  it  is  not  printed  by 
our  publishers ;  it  does  not  lie  even  in  the  dusty  corners 
of  our  bookcases ;  nay,  the  pious  English  scholar  must 
actually  send  to  Germany  for  Grein's  Bibliothek  in  order 
to  get  a  compact  reproduction  of  the  body  of  Old  English 
poetry. 

Nor  is  this  due  to  any  artistic  insensibility  on  our  part. 
Perhaps  it  will  sharpen  the  outlines  of  our  strange  atti- 
tude toward  tlie  works  of  our  own  tongue  if  we  contrast 
it  with  our  reverence  for  similar  works  in  other  tongues, 
—  say  the  Greek  and  Latin.  In  citing  some  brief  details  of 
such  a  contrast,  let  it  be  said  by  way  of  abundant  caution 
that  nothing  is  further  from  the  present  intention  than  to 
make  a  silly  question  as  between  the  value  of  the  an- 
cient classic  and  the  English  classic.  Terms  of  value  do 
not  apply  here  :  once  for  all,  the  prodigious  thoughts  of 
Greek  poetry  are  simply  invaluable,  they  permeate  all 
our  houses  like  indirect  sunlight ;  we  could  not  read  our 
life  without  them.  In  point  of  fact,  our  genuine  affection 
for  these  beautiful  foreign  works  is  here  adduced  because, 
in  establishing  our  love  for  great  poetry  in  general,  it 
necessarily  also  establishes  some  special  cause  for  our 
neglect  of  native  works  in  particular. 

For  example  :  we  are  all  ready  to  smile  with  a  lofty 
good  humor  when  we  find  Puttcnham  in  1589  devoting 
a  grave  chapter  to  prove  "  that  there  may  be  an  Arte  of 
our  English  Poesie  as  well  as  there  is  of  the  Latine  and 
Greekc  ;  "  we  remember  the  crushing  dcjmination  of  the 


138  Music  and   Poetry 

old  culture  in  his  time  and  before  it,  we  wonder  com- 
placently at  all  that  icy  business  of  "  elegant "  Latin 
verses  and  "  polite  "  literature,  and  we  feel  quite  com- 
fortable in  thinking  how  completely  we  have  changed 
these  matters. 

Have  we  ?  One  will  go  into  few  moderately  appointed 
houses  in  this  country  without  finding  a  Homer  in  some 
form  or  other ;  but  it  is  probably  far  within  the  truth  to 
say  that  there  are  not  fifty  copies  of  Beowulf  in  the 
United  States.^  Or  again,  every  boy,  though  far  less 
learned  than  that  erudite  young  person  of  Macaulay's,  can 
give  some  account  of  the  death  of  Hector ;  but  how 
many  boys  —  or,  not  to  mince  matters,  how  many  men 
—  in  America  could  do  more  than  stare  if  asked  to 
relate  the  death  of  Byrhtnoth?  Yet  Byrhtnoth  was  a 
hero  of  our  own  England  in  the  tenth  century,  whose 
manful  fall  is  recorded  in  English  words  that  ring  on  the 
soul  like  arrows  on  armor.  Why  do  we  not  draw  in  this 
poem  —  and  its  like  —  with  our  mother's  milk?  Why 
have  we  no  nursery  songs  of  Beowulf  and  the  Grendel  ? 
Why  does  not  the  serious  education  of  every  English- 
speaking  boy  commence,  as  a  matter  of  course,  with  the 
Anglo-Saxon  grammar? 

These  are  more  serious  questions  than  any  one  will 
be  prepared  to  believe  who  has  not  followed  them  out 
to  their  logical  results. 

For  the  absence  of  this  primal  Anglicism  from  our 
modern  system  goes  —  as  was  said  —  to  the  very  root  of 
culture.  The  eternal  and  immeasurable  significance  of 
that  individuality  in  thought  which  flows  into  idiom  in 
speech  becomes  notably  less  recognized  among  us.     We 

1  Since  this  was  written  (in  the  winter  of  1878-9),  two  editions 
of  the  work  have  been  published  here. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  139 

do  not  bring  with  us  out  of  our  childhood  the  fibre  of 
idiomatic  English  which  our  fathers  bequeathed  to  us. 
A  boy's  English  is  diluted  before  it  has  become  strong 
enough  for  him  to  make  up  his  mind  clearly  as  to  the 
true  taste  of  it.  Our  literature  needs  Anglo-Saxon  iron  ; 
there  is  no  ruddiness  in  its  cheeks,  and  everywhere  a 
clear  lack  of  the  red  corpuscles.  Current  English  prose, 
on  both  sides  of  the  water,  reveals  an  ideal  of  prose-writ- 
ing most  like  the  leaden  sky  of  a  November  day  that 
overspreads  the  earth  with  dreariness, — no  rift  in  its 
tissue  nor  fleck  in  its  tint.  Upon  any  soul  with  the  least 
feeling  for  color  the  model  "editorial"  of  the  day  leaves 
a  profound  dejection.  The  sentences  are  all  of  a  height, 
like  regulars  on  parade  ;  and  the  words  are  immaculately 
prim,  smug,  and  clean-shaven.  Out  of  all  this  regularity 
comes  a  certain  prudery  in  our  literature.  It  ought  not 
to  be  that  our  sensibilities  are  shocked  with  strong  in- 
dividualities of  style  like  Carlyle's  or  even  Ruskin's. 
One  even  finds  a  certain  curious  reaction  of  this  sensi- 
bility upon  these  men,  manful  as  they  are  ;  they  grow 
nervous  with  the  fine  sense  of  a  suspicion  of  charlatanry 
in  using  a  ruddy-cheeked  style  when  the  general  world 
writes  sallow-skinned  ;  and  hence  sometimes  too  much 
color  in  their  style,  —  a  blush,  as  it  were.  We  are  guilty 
of  a  gross  wrong  in  our  behavior  toward  these  authors 
and  their  like.  A  man  should  have  his  swing  in  his 
writing.  That  is  the  main  value  of  it :  not  to  sweep  me 
off  my  legs  with  eloquent  propagandism,  but  simply  to 
put  me  in  position  where  I  may  place  the  frank  and 
honest-spoken  view  of  another  man  alongside  my  own 
and  so  make  myself  as  large  as  two  men,  quoad  rem. 

But  we  lack  a  primal  idiomatic  bone  and  substance ; 
we  have  not  the  stalwart  Anglicism  of  style  which  can 


140  Music  and  Poetry 

tolerate  departures,  breaks,  and  innovations ;  we  are  as 
uncomfortable  over  our  robustious  Carlyle  as  an  invalid, 
all  nerves,  with  a  great  rollicking  boy  in  the  room,  —  we 
do  not  know  what  he  may  do  next. 

How  wonderful  this  seems,  if  we  take  time  to  think 
what  a  strong,  bright,  picture-making  tongue  we  had  in 
the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century  when  the  power- 
ful old  Anglo-Saxon  had  fairly  conquered  all  the  foreign 
elements  into  its  own  idiom  !  For  it  is  about  with  the 
beginning  of  that  century  that  we  may  say  we  had  a 
fully  developed  English  literary  instrument.  Chaucer 
was  not,  and  could  not  be,  the  well  of  English  undefiled 
which  Spencer's  somewhat  forgetful  antiquarianism  would 
have  him.  He  was  fed  with  two  streams  of  language 
which  were  still  essentially  distinct  in  many  particulars. 
It  was  a  long  while  before  the  primal  English  conquered 
the  alien  elements  into  its  own  idioms,  longer,  indeed, 
in  Chaucer's  world  than  in  Langland's. 

Almost  every  house  will  furnish  the  means  of  placing 
in  sharps  contrast  the  vivacity  and  robust  manfulness  of 
the  English  language  early  in  the  sixteenth  century,  and 
the  more  flaccid  tongue  which  had  begun  to  exist  even 
as  early  as  the  eighteenth.  Warton's  History  of  English 
Poetry,  for  example,  collates  a  couple  of  stanzas  from 
The  Nut-Brown  Maid — which  must  belong  to  the  end 
of  the  fifteenth  or  the  beginning  of  the  sixteenth  century 
—  with  the  corresponding  stanzas  of  a  paraphrase  made 
by  Prior  in  i  718.  It  may  not  be  amiss  to  make  sure  by 
inserting  one  of  these  examples  here.  In  the  original 
ballad,  the  wild  lover,  testing  the  girl's  affection,  cries  : 

"  Yet  take  good  hade,  for  ever  I  drede 
That  ye  could  nat  sustayne 
The  thornie  wayes,  the  depe  valeis, 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  141 

The  snowe,  the  frost,  the  rayne, 

The  colde,  the  hete ;  for,  dry  or  wete, 

We  must  lodge  on  the  playne ; 

And  us  abofe  none  other  rofe 

But  a  brake  bush  or  tvvayne ; 

"Which  sone  sholde  greve  you,  I  believe, 

And  ye  wolde  gladly  than 

That  I  had  to  the  grene  wode  go 

Alone,  a  banyshed  man." 

•I  cannot  see  how  language  could  well  have  put  it 
feather  than  that;  but,  two  hundred  years  afterward, 
this  is  Prior's  idea  of  the  way  it  should  have  been  said : 

"  Those  limbs,  in  lawn  and  softest  silk  array'd, 
From  sunbeams  guarded  and  of  winds  afraid. 
Can  they  bear  angry  Jove  ?     Can  they  resist 
The  parching  dog-star  and  the  bleak  northeast  ? 
When,  chill'd  by  adverse  snows  and  beating  rain, 
We  tread  with  weary  steps  the  longsome  plain  ; 
When  with  hard  toil  we  seek  our  evening  food, 
Berries  and  acorns  from  the  neighbouring  wood; 
And  find  among  the  cliffs  no  other  house 
But  the  thin  covert  of  some  gather'd  boughs  ; 
Wilt  thou  not  then  reluctant  send  thine  eye 
Around  the  dreary  waste,  and,  weeping,  try 
(Though  then,  alas  !  that  trial  be  too  late) 
To  find  thy  father's  hospitable  gate, 
And  seats  where  ease  and  plenty  brooding  sate  ? 
Those  seats,  whence  long  excluded  thou  must  mourn; 
That  gate,  for  ever  barr'd  to  thy  return  ; 
Wilt  thou  not  then  bewail  ill-fated  love, 
And  hate  a  banish'd  man,  condemn'd  in  woods  to  rove  ?" 

Or.  if  it  be  objected  that  this  may  be  an  exaggerated 
single  example  which  proves  little,  almost  every  book- 
case contains  Thomas  Johnes's  translation  of  Froissart, 
in  the  notes  to  which  occur  here  and  there  extracts  of 
parallel  passages  from  Lord  Berners's  translation,  made 
in  the  time  of  Henry  VIII. ;  and  the  least  comparison  of 


142  Music  and  Poetry 

Berners  with  Johncs  shows  how  immeasurably  more  bright, 
many-colored,  and  powerful  is  the  speech  of  the  former. 

And  this  brightness,  color,  and  power  make  for  the 
doctrine  of  this  present  writing,  because  they  are  simply 
exuberant  manifestations  of  pure  Anglicism  put  forth  in 
the  moment  of  its  triumph.  We  are  all  prone  to  forget 
the  odds  against  which  this  triumph  was  achieved.  For 
four  hundred  years  —  that  is,  in  round  numbers,  from 
670  to  1070  —  the  Englisc  language  was  desperately 
striving  to  get  into  literature,  against  the  sacred  wishes 
of  Latin  ;  and  now,  when  the  Normans  come,  the  tongue 
of  Aldhelm  and  Csedmon,  of  Alfred  and  ^Ifric  and 
Cynewulf,  must  begin  and  fight  again  for  another  four 
hundred  years  against  French,  —  fight,  too,  in  such 
depths  of  disadvantage  as  may  be  gathered  from  many  a 
story  of  the  relentless  Norman  efforts  to  exterminate  the 
native  tongue.  Witness,  for  example,  Matthew  Paris's 
account  of  the  deposition  of  the  Bishop  of  Worcester  in 
1095  by  the  Normans  because  he  "was  a  superannuated 
English  idiot  who  could  not  speak  French ; "  or  Ralph 
Higden's  complaint,  as  John  Trevisa  translates  it  from 
the  Polychro7iicon :  "  Children  in  scole,  ayenst  the  usage 
and  manir  of  all  other  nations,  beeth  compelled  for  to 
leve  hire  owne  langage  and  for  to  construe  hire  lessons 
and  hire  thinges  in  French ;  and  so  they  haveth  sethe 
Normans  came  first  into  Engelond  ;  "  moreover,  "  Gen- 
tilmen  children  beeth  taught  to  speke  Frensche  from 
the  tyme  that  they  bith  rokked  in  hire  cradle  and  kum- 
eth  speke  and  play  with  a  child's  broche." 

Eight  hundred  years  the  tough  old  tongue  has  been 
grimly  wrestling  and  writhing,  life  and  death  on  the 
issue,  now  under  this  enemy,  now  under  that,  when  Lord 
Berners  and  Sir  Thomas  More  begin  to  speak. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  143 

It  is  therefore  with  all  the  sacred  sanction  of  this 
long  conflict  that  a  man  can  drive  home  upon  our  time 
these  following  charges  :  first,  that  it  is  doing  its  best,  in 
most  of  iis  purely  literary  work,  to  convert  the  large, 
manful,  and  simple  idioms  of  Alfred  and  Cynewulf  into 
the  small,  finical,  and  knowing  clevernesses  of  a  smart 
half-culture,  which  knows  neither  whence  it  came  nor 
whither  it  is  going ;  and  secondly,  that  as  a  people  we 
are  utterly  ignorant  of  even  the  names  of  the  products 
of  English  genius  during  the  first  four  hundred  of  the 
eight  hundred  years  just  mentioned,  insomuch  that  if  a 
fervent  English-lover  desire  to  open  his  heart  to  some 
one  about  Beowulf,  or  The  Battle  of  Maldon,  or  The 
Wamlej-er,  or  Dear's  Lament,  or  The  Phce7iix,  or  The 
Sea-farer,  or  The  Address  of  the  Departed  Soul  to  its 
Body,  or  Elene,  or  the  like,  he  must  do  it  by  letter,  for 
there  are  scarcely  anywhere  two  in  a  town  who  have  read, 
or  can  read,  these  poems. 

In  short,  our  literary  language  ^  has  suffered  a  dilution 
much  like  that  which  music  has  undergone  at  the  hands 
of  the  weaker  devotees  since  the  free  use  of  the  semi- 
tone began.  Soon  after  the  chromatic  tone  has  attained 
its  place  a  wonderful  flexibility  shows  itself  in  music,  the 
art  expands  in  many  directions,  the  province  of  harmony 
becomes  indefinitely  large  ;  but  this  very  freedom  proves 
the  ruin  of  the  weaker  brethren  :  the  facilities  of  modu- 
lation afforded  by  the  minor  chords  and  the  diminished 
sevenths  tempt  into  unmeaning  and  cloying  imperti- 
nences of  composition,  and  these  have  to  be  relieved, 
again,  by  setting  over-harsh  and  crabbed  chords  in  the 
midst  of  a  too  gracious  flow  of  tone. 

^  As  distinguished  from  the  modem  scientific  English,  which 
is  certainly  an  admirable  instrument  in  tlic  hands  of  Tyndall,  of 
Huxley,  and  of  many  more. 


144  Music  and  Poetry 

Now,  as  music  has  reached  a  point  where  it  must 
pause,  and  re-estabhsh  the  dominancy  of  the  whole  tone, 
fortifying  it  with  whatever  new  tones  may  be  found 
possible  in  developing  the  scale  according  to  primal  — 
or  what  we  may  call  musically  idiomatic  —  principles,  so 
must  our  tongue  recur  to  the  robust  forms,  and  from 
these  to  the  underlying  and  determining  genius,  of  its 
Anglo-Saxon  ^  period. 

In  other  words,  —  for  what  has  so  far  been  said  has 
been  in  defence  and  explication  of  the  sentence  which 
stands  at  the  beginning  of  this  paper,  —  culture  must  be 
cited  into  the  presence  of  the  Fathers. 

In  the  humblest  hope  of  contributing  to  that  end,  I 
eagerly  embrace  the  opportunity  of  calling  the  general 
reader's  attention  to  the  rhythmical  movement  —  and 
afterward  to  the  spiritual  movement  —  of  an  Anglo-Saxon 
poem  dating  from  about  A.  d.  993,  known  as  The  Death 
of  Byrhtnoth,  or  otherwise  as  The  Battle  of  Maldon, 
which,  in  the  judgment  of  my  ear,  sets  the  grace  of 
loyalty  and  the  grimness  of  battle  to  noble  music.  I 
think  no  man  could  hear  this  poem  read  aloud  without 
feeling  his  heart  beat  faster  and  his  blood  stir. 

The  rhythm  of  this  poem  —  let  it  be  observed  as  the 
reader  goes  through  the  scheme  —  is  strikingly  varied 
in  time-distribution  from  bar  to  bar.  The  poem,  in 
fact,  counts  with  perfect  confidence  upon  the  sense  of 
rhythm,  which  is  well-nigh  universal  in  our  race,  often 
boldly  opposing  a  single  syllable  in  one  bar  to  three  or 
four  in  the  next.  I  should  not  call  this  "bold"  except 
for  the  timidity  of  English  poetry  during  the  last  two 

1  A  term  for  which  it  is  now  pretty  generally  agreed  to  substi- 
tute "  Old  English."  I  shall  use  the  two  interchangeably  in  this 
paper. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  145 

hundred  years,  when  it  has  scarcely  ever  dared  to  ven- 
ture out  of  the  round  of  its  strictly  defined  iambics,  for- 
getting how  freely  our  folk  songs  and  nursery  rhymes 
employ  rhythms  and  rhythmic  breaks,  —  as  "  Pease  por- 
ridge hot,"  for  example,  or  almost  any  verse  out  of 
Mother  Goose,  —  which,  though  "complex"  from  the 
standpoint  of  our  customary  rhythmic  limitations,  are 
instantly  seized  and  co-ordinated  by  children  and  child- 
minded  nurses.^ 

[Apart  from  its  literary  merit,  this  poem  has  other 
features  of  interest.  It  is  an  example,  perhaps  singular, 
of  an  epic  contemporary  with  the  events  it  recites,  and 
probably  written  by  one  who  had  a  share  in  the  battle. 
The  poet's  point  of  view  never  moves  from  the  English 
side ;  he  does  not  know  what  is  done  or  said  among 
the  Danes ;  he  knows  none  of  their  names,  not  even 
that  of  their  leader,  though  he  was  the  redoubted  Anlaf, 
or  Olaf  Tryggvason,  king  of  Norway.  We  may  there- 
fore rely  on  its  being  a  faithful  picture  of  what  was 
done,  said,  and  even  thought  during  this  last  resolute 
stand   of  England   against  the  Wikings, 

The  incident  itself  is  memorable.  In  a.  d.  979, 
./Ethelred  Lack-Counsel  (generally  called  "  the  Un- 
ready") was  crowned  at  Kingston,  and  the  "bloody 
cloud  in  the  likeness  of  fire,  seen  at  midnight,"  which 
followed  that  event,  may  well  have  seemed  to  the  old 
chronicler,  in  the  light  of  later  experience,  a  foretoken- 
ing of  the  years  to  come,  when  the  heavens,  night  after 
night,  were    red  with   the  glare   of  burning  towns  and 

1  The  historical  paragraphs  following  (in  brackets)  have  been 
supplied  by  Dr.  William  Hand  Browne,  to  fill  a  gap  in  the  origi- 
nal manuscript,  where  sixteen  pages  are  lacking. 

ID 


146  Music  and   Poetry 

homesteads,  and  the  ground  was  crimson  with  the  blood 
of  the  slaughtered  English.  Eor  the  Danes  had  begun 
their  terrible  invasions,  and  met  with  but  little  resist- 
ance. In  the  next  year,  Leicester,  Thanct,  and  South- 
ampton were  plundered,  and  the  inhabitants  "  mostly 
slain,"  says  the  chronicle;  in  the  next,  Padstow  in  Corn- 
wall was  plundered,  and  Devonshire  harried  with  fire 
and  sword ;  in  the  next,  London  was  burnt.  We  come 
at  last  to  the  year  991,  and  we  are  told:  — 

"  In  this  year  came  Anlaf  with  ninety-three  ships  to 
Staines  and  harried  all  roundabout  that ;  and  then  fared 
thence  to  Sandwich,  and  thence  on  to  Ipswich,  and 
overran  all  that,  and  so  to  Maldon  [Essex].  And 
there  against  them  came  the  ealdorman  Byrhtnoth  with 
his  army,  and  fought  with  them,  and  they  slew  the 
ealdorman  and  held  the  battlefield.  And  in  this  year 
for  the  first  time  men  counselled  that  they  should  rather 
pay  tribute  to  the  Danish  men  for  the  mickle  terror 
that  they  wrought  at  the  sea-coasts.  And  the  tribute 
was  at  first  a  thousand  pounds.  The  giver  of  the 
counsel  was  Sigeric  the  archbishop." 

It  is  plain  from  this  that  the  fall  of  Byrhtnoth  snapped 
the  sinews  of  English  resistance ;  and  from  this  time 
forth  we  read  of  nothing  but  feeble  and  futile  muster- 
ings  of  men,  without  plan  or  concert  of  action,  and  all 
to  no  purpose :  half-battles  lost  because  the  support 
did  not  arrive  in  time ;  fleets  ordered  to  help  the 
land  force,  and  coming  after  all  was  over ;  "  and  ever," 
says  the  chronicler,  "  when  they  should  have  been  for- 
warder, then  were  they  later,  ain  ever  the  foes  waxed 
more  and  more."  And  the  tribute  grew  heavier  and 
heavier,  and  there  was  less  to  pay  it  with,  and  leaders 
like   .^Ifric  turned  traitors  in  sKeeir  despair,  until  tjbie. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  147 

doomed  king,  crowning  a  life  of  imbecility  by  a  deed 
of  bloody  madness,  slaughtered  the  peaceful  colonists 
of  the  Danelagh,  and  Swegen  came  in  a  storm  of  fire 
and  blood,  hurling  the  wretched  descendant  of  Cerdic 
from  the  throne,  and  England  bent  her  neck  to  the 
Danish  rule.  After  half  a  century,  two  phantoms  of  a 
monk  and  a  warrior,  Edward  and  Harold,  seemed  to 
wear  the  Saxon  crown  ;  but  the  monarchy  of  Alfred  re- 
ceived its  death-blow  at  Maldon,  not  because  the  East 
Saxon  militia  was  broken,  but  because  Byrhtnoth  fell. 

And  now  who  was  Byrhtnoth  ?  The  chronicler,  over- 
much given  to  recording  investitures  and  deaths  of 
bishops  and  abbots,  tells  us  but  little ;  but  from  the 
Book  of  Ely,  an  abbey  founded  by  Byrhtnoth  himself, 
we  get  glimpses  of  him,  probably  from  the  hand  of  one 
who  had  seen  him  face  to  face.  He  was  Ealdorman  — 
that  is,  lord  or  general  —  of  the  East  Saxons,  and  one 
of  the  greatest  nobles  in  England.  "  He  was,"  says  the 
monkish  historian,  "  eloquent  of  speech,  great  of  stature, 
exceeding  strong,  most  skilful  in  war,  and  of  courage 
that  knew  no  fear.  He  spent  his  whole  life  in  defend- 
ing the  liberty  of  his  country,  being  altogether  absorbed 
in  this  one  desire,  and  preferring  to  die  rather  than  to 
leave  one  of  its  injuries  unavenged.  And  all  the  leaders 
of  the  shires  put  their  trust  altogether  in  him." 

After  telling  of  several  of  his  victories,  the  historian 
comes  to  his  last  fight.  His  force  was  far  inferior  to 
that  of  the  invaders,  but  he  hastened  to  meet  them 
without  waiting  for  reinforcements,  —  a  piece  of  rash- 
ness like  that  recorded  in  the  poem,  where,  from  mere 
excess  of  haughty  courage,  he  disdains  to  defend  the 
ford  of  Panta,  and  lets  the  Wikings  cross  unmolested,  a 
fatal  hardihood  which  cost  him  the  battle  and  his  life. 


1 48  Music  and   Poetry 

On  his  march  thither  he  stopped  at  Ramsey  Abbey,  and 
asked  for  provisions  for  his  men.     The  abbot  said  that 
it  was  not  possible  for  him  to  feed  so  great  a  number, 
but,  not  to  seem  churlish,  he  would  receive  as  his  guests 
the   ealdorman  himself  and   seven  others.      Byrhtnoth 
rejected  the  mean  offer  with  scorn  :    "  I  cannot  fight 
without  them,"  he   said,  "and  I  will  not  eat  without 
them,"  and  so  marched  on  to  Ely,  where  Abbot  ^Ifsig 
bounteously  entertained  him  and  his  force.     "  But  the 
ealdorman,  thinking  that  he  had  been  burdensome  to 
the  abbey,  would  not  leave  it  unrewarded ;  and  on  the 
following  morning  bestowed  upon  it  six  rich   manors, 
and  promised  nine  more,  with  thirty  marks  of  gold  and 
twenty  pounds  of  silver,  on  the  condition  that  if  he  fell 
in  the  battle  his  body  should  be  brought  and   buried 
there.     To  this  gift  he  also  added  two  crosses  of  gold 
and  two  vestments  richly  adorned  with  gold  and  gems, 
and  a  pair  of  curiously  wrought  gloves.     And  so,  com- 
mending  himself  to    the   prayers   of  the   brethren,  he 
went  forth  to  meet  the  enemy. 

"  When  he  met  them,  undeterred  by  the  multitude  of 
foes  and  the  fewness  of  his  own  men,  he  attacked  them 
at  once,  and  for  fourteen  days  fought  with  them  daily. 
But  on  the  last  day,  but  few  of  his  men  being  left 
alive,  and  perceiving  that  he  was  to  die,  he  attacked 
them  with  none  the  less  courage,  and  had  almost  put 
them  to  flight,  when  the  Danes,  taking  heart  from  the 
small  numbers  of  the  English,  formed  their  force  into  a 
wedge,  and  threw  themselves  upon  them.  Byrhtnoth 
was  slain,  fighting  valiantly,  and  the  enemy  cut  off  his 
head  and  bare  it  with  them  to  their  own  country." 

Plainly  a  prince  of  men,  and  the  true  kiiig  of  England 
Alt  that  day,  though  he  never  wavered  in  his  allegiance  to 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  149 

"  ^thelred,  my  prince."  And  this  last  day  of  the  "  great 
dim  battle  "  in  the  east,  more  worthy  the  poet's  song 
than  that  merely  fabulous  "  battle  in  the  west  "  which  the 
late  Laureate  celebrated  in  such  ringing  verse,  —  this 
last  agony  of  the  last  vigorous  struggle  to  free  England 
from  the  ferocious  invaders,  is  the  subject  of  the  poem. 

True,  Byrhtnoth  is  not  so  musical  a  name  as  Arthur, 
and  Leofsunu  and  Wulfmser  sound  harsh  compared  with 
Lancelot  and  Percivale ;  but  the  fantastic  chivalry  of  the 
Round  Table  and  their  phantom-like  king  are  not  only 
historically  untrue,  but  merely  impossible,  —  a  bright- 
hued  web  of  the  stuff  that  dreams  are  made  of,  —  while 
these  gallant  men  of  Essex  and  their  heroic  chief  verita- 
bly lived,  and  fought,  and  died  where  they  stood,  rather 
than  yield  one  foot  of  English  ground  or  forsake  their 
fallen  leader ;  and  they  were  men  of  our  own  race,  and  it 
may  be  that  their  blood  flows  in  our  own  veins. 

But  though  they  have  not  been  thought  worthy  the 
dainty  music  of  Victorian  verse,  they  have  not  lacked 
a  poet  —  probably  a  soldier-poet,  for  his  lines  foil  like 
sword-strokes  on  helmets.  He  has  not  written  for  crit- 
ics, but  for  East  Saxons,  East  Angles,  Northumbrians, 
who  had  looked  to  Byrhtnoth  as  their  shield,  and  whose 
kindred  had  formed  that  narrowing  ring  that  circled 
his  corpse,  "  their  mood  growing  more  as  their  might 
lessened."  ^Ve  have  here  no  wail  of  lamentation  over 
the  fallen  leader ;  the  poet  will  not  let  us  see  his  tears ; 
yet  the  eye  must  have  been  dim  that  watched  him  cast 
loose  his  "beloved  hawk,"  knowing  that  she  would 
never  again  come  to  his  call,  and  the  hand  must  have 
trembled  that  recorded  the  hero's  dying  prayer. 

Nay,  we  hardly  are  shown  the  poet's  personality  at 
all,  intense  as  his  feelings  must  have  been :  of  the  fatal 


i^o  Music  and   Poetry 

error  that  lost  the  battle,  he  merely  says,  "  the  earl,  for 
his  overniood,  left  too  much  land  to  the  hostile  people  ;  " 
of  the  flight  of  Godric  he  simply  remarks  that  "  more 
men  fled  with  him  than  was  right,  if  they  had  remem- 
bered all  the  kindness  he  [Byrhtnoth]  had  shown  them  ;  " 
and  when  Ofi'a  keeps  his  pledge  to  his  chief  to  live  or 
die  with  him,  he  breaks  into  no  psean  over  his  fidelity, 
but  says  simply,  "he  lay,  thane-like,  by  his  lord's 
side." 

Unflincliing  courage,  personal  devotion  to  the  chief, 
absolute  contempt  of  death,  are  matters  of  course  in  this 
warrior-poet's  mind,  and  need  no  particular  eulogy.  Of 
these  qualities,  two  yet  abide  with  the  race ;  but  the 
third,  the  passionate  love  of  the  thane  for  his  prince,  a 
love  passing  the  love  of  woman  —  so  tenderly  sung  in 
The  Wanderer  —  this  we  are  not  hkely  to  see  again. 
It  is  much  to  be  doubted  whether  in  that  "  passage  of 
society  from  status  to  contract,"  so  dear  to  the  political 
economist,  we  have  gained  any  equivalent  for  the  loss. 
Men  are,  as  yet,  still  capable  of"  falling  thane-like  ;  "  but 
not  of  saying,  "  never  shall  the  thanes  reproach  me  that 
I  would  return  to  my  home,  now  that  my  prince  lieth 
hewn  down  in  fight."  ^] 

I  have  translated  two  hundred  Hues  of  the  poem,  — 
which  is  a  fragment  of  three  hundred  and  twenty-five 
lines  in  all,  without  the  original  beginning  or  end,  — 
with  special  reference  to  two  matters. 

(i)  In  the  first  hundred  lines  —  being  the  first  hun- 
dred of  the  poem  as  it  stands  —  I  have  had  particu- 
larly in  view  the  send  and  drive  of  the  rhythm;  and 
to  keep  these  in  the  reader's  mind  I  have  made  the  trans- 

1  End  of  Dr.  William  Hand  Browne's  manuscript. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  151 

lation,  so  far  as  the  end  of  that  hundred,  mostly  in  dac- 
tyls, which  continually  urge  the  voice  forward  to  the 
next  word,  with  an  occasional  trochee  for  breath  and 
variety. 

(2)   But  in  my  second  hundred  lines  —  being  those 
consecutively  following  the  first,  up  to  the  hundred  and 
eighty-fifth  line  of  the  poem,  when  I  pass  to  the  last  six- 
teen, with  an  intercalary  account  in  short  of  the  matter 
of  the  intervening  hundred  and    twenty-five  —  I    have 
abandoned  the  metrical  purpose,  and  changed  the  para- 
mount object  to  that  of  showing  the  peculiar  idioms  of 
Anglo-Saxon  poetry  :  the  order  of  words,  the  vigorous 
use  of  noun  and  verb,  the  parallelisms  and   repetitions 
(like  those  of  Hebrew  poetry,  as  in  the  lines  near  the 
last,  "  ^Ifnod  and  Wulfmser  lay  slain ;    by  the  side  of 
their  prince  they  parted  with   life"),  and   the   like.     I 
have  thought  that  the  modern  reader  might  contemplate 
with  special  profit  the  sparing  use  of  those  particles  — 
such  as  "  the,"  "a"  or  "  an,"  "  his,"  "  their,"  and  others 
—  which  have  made  the  modern  tongue  so  different  from 
the  old,  both  in  its  rhythmical  working  and  in  its  weight 
or  momentum.     The  old  tongue  is  notably  sterner,  and 
often   stronger,  by  its  ability  to  say  "  man,"   "  horse," 
"shield,"  and  not  "  the  man,"  "^  horse,"  ''his  shield," 
etc. ;  and  it  is  an  interesting  question,  at  least,  whether 
we  might  not  with  advantage  educate  our  modern  sense 
to  be  less  shocked  by  the  omission  of  these  particles 
at  need.     Without   here  adducing  many  considerations 
which  would  have  to  be  weighed  before  any  one  could 
make  up  his  judgment  on  this  point,  I  have  simply  called 
attention  to  these  particles,  where  modern  usage  required 
me  to  supply  them  in  the  translation,  by  inclosing  them 
in  parentheses. 


152  Music  and   Poetry 

In  both  the  metrical  and  the  unmetrical  portions  of 
the  translation  I  have  discarded  the  arrangement  into 
lines  as  interfering  with  the  objects  in  view;  the  poem 
showing  clearly  enough,  by  the  plane  of  its  thought,  that 
it  IS  a  poem,  though  presented  in  whatever  forms  of 
prose. 

The  fragment  begins  with  the  last  two  words  of  some 
sentence,  "  brocen  wurde  "  (was  broken),  and  then  pro- 
ceeds as  follows. 

Bade  then  (that  is,  Byrhtnoth  bade)  each  warrior 
loose  him  his  horse  and  drive  it  afar,  and  fare  thus  on  to 
the  hand-fight,  hopeful  of  heart. 

Then  straightway  the  stripling  of  Offa  beheld  that  the 
earl  would  abide  no  cowardly  thing  :  so  there  from  his 
hand  he  let  fly  his  falcon,  beloved,  away  through  the 
wood  and  strode  to  the  battle,  and  man  might  know 
that  never  that  youth  would  fail  from  the  fight  when 
once  he  fell  to  his  weapon.  Thereat  Eadric  was  minded 
to  stand  by  his  ealdorman  fast  in  the  fight ;  forth  'gan 
bear  his  javelin  foe-ward,  manful  in  mood,  whilever  that 
he  in  his  hands  might  hold  his  buckler  and  broadsword ; 
his  vaunt  he  avouched  with  his  deeds,  that  there  he 
should  fight  in  front  of  his  prince. 

Then  Byrhtnoth  began  to  array  him  his  warriors,  rode 
and  directed,  counselled  the  fighters  how  they  should 
stand  and  steadfastly  hold  to  their  places,  showed  them 
how  shields  should  be  gripped  full  hard  with  the  hand, 
and  bade  them  to  fear  not  at  all.  When  fairly  his  folk 
were  formed  he  alighted  in  midst  of  the  liegemen  that 
loved  him  fondliest ;  there  full  well  he  wist  that  his  faith- 
fullest  hearth-fighters  were. 

Then  stood  forth  one  from  the  vikings,  strongly  called, 
uttered  his  words,  shouted  the  sea-rogues'  threat  to  the 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  153 

earl  where  he  stood  on  the  adverse  shore  :  "  Me  have 
the  scathful  seamen  sent,  and  bidden  me  say  that  now 
must  thou  render  rings  ^  for  thy  ransom,  and  better  for 
you  shall  it  be  that  ye  buy  oif  a  battle  with  tribute  than 
trust  the  hard-dealing  of  war.  No  need  that  we  harm 
us,  if  only  ye  heed  this  message  ;  firm  will  we  fashion  a 
peace  with  the  gold.  If  thou  that  art  richest  wouldst 
ransom  thy  people,  pay,  for  a  peace,  what  the  seamen 
shall  deem  to  be  due;  we  will  get  us  to  ship  with 
the  gold,  and  fare  off  over  the  flood,  and  hold  you 
acquit." 

Byrhtnoth  cried  to  him,  brandished  the  buckler,  shook 
the  slim  ash,  with  words  made  utterance,  wrathful  and 
resolute,  gave  him  his  answer :  "  Hearest  thou,  sea- 
rover,  that  which  my  folk  sayeth?  Yes,  we  will  render 
you  tribute  ...  in  javelins  —  poisonous  point,  and  old- 
time  blade  —  good  weapons,  yet  forward  you  not  in  the 
fight.  Herald  of  pirates,  be  herald  once  more  :  bear  to 
thy  people  a  bitterer  message,  —  that  here  stands  daunt- 
less an  earl  with  his  warriors,  will  keep  us  this  country, 
land  of  my  lord.  Prince  ^thelred,  —  folk  and  field  : 
the  heathen  shall  perish  in  battle.  Too  base,  methink- 
eth,  that  ye  with  your  gold  should  get  you  to  ship  all  un- 
foughten  with,  now  that  so  far  ye  have  come  to  be  in  our 
land  :  never  so  soft  shall  ye  slink  with  your  treasure 
away  :  us  shall  persuade  both  point  and  blade  —  grim 
game  of  war  —  ere  we  pay  you  for  peace." 

Bade  he  then  bear  forward  bucklers,  and  warriors  go, 
till  they  all  stood  ranged  on  the  bank  that  was  east. 
Now  there,  for  the  water,  might  never  a  foeman  come  to 
the  other :   there  came  flowing  the  flood  after  ebb-tide, 

1  Rings,  that  is,  of  gold,  —  a  favorite  form  of  treasure  among 
our  An^^lo-Saxon  ancestors. 


154  Music  and   Poetry 

mingled  the  streams :  too  long  it  seemed  to  them,  ere 
that  together  the  spears  would  come.^ 

•  •••••••• 

[There  stood  they  in  their  strength  by  Panta's  stream, 
the  East-Saxon  force  and  the  ship-host :  nor  might  either 
of  them  harm  the  other,  save  when  one  fell  by  an  arrow's 
flight. 

The  tide  outflowed;  the  pirates  stood  yare,  many 
vikings  wistful  for  war.] 

Bade  them  the  Shelter-of-Men  ^  a  war-hardened  war- 
rior hold  him  the  bridge,  who  Wulfstan  was  hight,  bold 
with  his  kinsmen,  Ceola's  son ;  he  smote  with  his 
spear  the  flrst  man  down  that  stepped  over-bold  on 
the  bridge.  There  stood  by  Wulfstan  warriors  dauntless, 
Maccus  and  ^Ifere,  proud-souled  twain;  they  recked 
not  of  flight  at  the  ford,  but  stoutly  strove  with  the  foe 
what  while  they  could  wield  their  weapons.  When  they' 
encountered  and  eagerly  saw  how  bitter  the  bridgewards 
were,  then  the  hostile  guests  betook  them  to  cunning : 
ordered  to  seize  the  ascents,  and  fare  through  the  ford 
and  lead  up  the  line.  Now  the  earl  in  his  over-bold 
mood  gave  over-much  *  land  to  the  foe.  There,  while 
the  warriors  whist,  fell  Byrhthelm's  bairn  °  to  calling  over 
the  waters  cold  :  — 

"  Now  there  is  room  for  you,  rush  to  us,  warriors  to 
warfare  ;  God  wot,  only,  which  of  us  twain  shall  possess 
this  place  of  the  slaughter." 

1  A  short  gap  in  the  manuscript  is  here  supplied  by  Dr. 
William  Hand  Browne. 

'^  Byrhtnoth. 

'  The  pirates. 

*  Voluntarily  drew  back  and  allowed  them  to  gain  the  hither 
bank,  in  order  to  bring  on  the  fight. 

6  Byrhtnoth. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  155 

Waded  the  war-wolves  west  over  Panta,  recked  not  of 
water,  warrior  vikings.  There,  o'er  the  wave  they  bore 
up  their  bucklers,  the  seamen  lifted  their  shields  to  the 
land.  In  wait  with  his  warriors,  Byrhtnoth  stood ;  he 
bade  form  the  war-hedge  of  bucklers,  and  hold  that 
ward  firm  to  the  foe.  The  fight  was  at  hand,  the  glory 
of  battle  ;  the  time  was  come  for  the  falling  of  men  that 
were  doomed. 

There  was  a  scream  uphoven,  ravens  hovered,  (and) 
the  eagle  sharp  for  carnage ;  on  earth  was  clamor. 

They  let  from  (their)  hands  (the)  file-hard  spears, 
(the)  sharp-ground  javelins,  fly ;  bows  were  busy,  shield 
caught  spear-point,  bitter  was  the  battle-rush,  warriors 
fell,  on  either  hand  warriors  lay.  Wounded  was  Wulf- 
maer,  chose  (his)  bed  of  death,  Byrhtnoth's  kinsman, 
his  sister's  son ;  he  with  bills  was  in  pieces  hewn. 
(But)  there  to  the  vikings  was  quittance  made  ;  heard  I 
that  Edward  slew  one  sheerly  with  his  sword,  withheld 
not  the  swing  (of  it),  that  to  him  at  feet  fell  (the)  fated 
warrior.  For  that  his  prince  said  thanks  to  him  —  to  his 
bower-thane  —  when  he  had  time.  So  dutiful  wrought 
(the)  strong-souled  fighters  at  battle,  keenly  considered 
who  there  might  quickliest  pierce  with  (his)  weapon  ; 
carnage  fell  on  earth.  Stood  (they)  steadfast.  Byrht- 
noth heartened  them,  bade  that  each  warrior  mind  him 
of  battle  that  would  fight  out  glory  upon  (the)  Danes. 

Waded  then  (forward)  (a)  warrior  tough,  upheaved 
(his)  weapon,  shield  at  ward,  and  strode  at  the  earl ;  as 
resolute  went  the  earl  to  the  carl :  ^  each  of  them  to  the 
other  meant  mischief.  Sent  then  the  sea-warrior  (a) 
Southern  spear  that  the  lord  of  warriors  -  was  wounded  ; 

1  The  churl,  —  common  person,  or  yeoman. 

2  Byrhtnoth. 


156  Music  and   Poetry 

he  wrought  then  with  his  shield  that  the  shaft  burst  in 
pieces  and  that  spear  broke  that  it  sprang  again,  Angry- 
souled  was  the  warrior ;  he  with  (his)  spear  stung  the 
proud  viking  that  gave  him  his  wound.  Prudent  was  the 
chieftain ;  he  let  his  spear  wade  through  the  viking's 
neck ;  (his)  hand  guided  it  that  it  reached  to  the  life  of 
his  dangerous  foe.  Then  he  suddenly  shot  another  that 
his  corselet  burst ;  he  was  wounded  in  the  breast  through 
the  ring-mail ;  at  his  heart  stood  the  fatal  spear-point. 
The  earl  was  all  the  blither ;  laughed  the  valorous  man, 
said  thanks  to  the  Creator  for  the  day's-work  that  the 
Lord  gave  him. 

Then  some  (one)  of  the  warriors  let  fly  from  his  hand 
a  dart  that  it  forthright  passed  through  the  noble  thane  ^ 
of  .^thelred.  Then  stood  him  beside  an  unwaxen  war- 
rior,*^ a  boy  in  fight ;  he  full  boldly  plucked  from  the 
prince  the  bloody  javelin  (VVulfstan's  son,  Wulfmger 
the  young)  ;  let  the  sharp  (steel)  fare  back  again ;  the 
spear-point  pierced  that  he  lay  on  the  earth  who  before 
had  grievously  wounded  the  prince.  Ran  there  a  cun- 
ning warrior  to  the  earl ;  he  wished  to  plunder  the 
prince  of  (his)  treasures,  armor  and  rings  and  adorned 
sword.  Then  Byrhtnoth  drew  from  sheath  his  broad  and 
brown-edged  sword  and  smote  on  the  (warrior's)  corse- 
let :  (but)  too  soon  one  of  the  pirates  prevented  him ; 
he  maimed  the  arm  of  the  earl ;  fell  to  the  ground  the 
yellow-hilted  sword ;  he  might  not  hold  the  hard  blade, 
not  wield  (a)  weapon.  There  nevertheless  some  words 
spoke  the  hoary  chieftain,  heartened  his  warriors,  bade 
the  good  comrades  go  forward  ;  now  no  longer  could  he 
stand  firm  on  (his)  feet ;  he  looked  towards  heaven  :  — 

1  Byrhtnoth. 

2  That  is,  a  youthful  warrior. 


The  Death  of  Byrhtnoth  157 


<s 


I  thank  Thee,  Ruler  of  nations,  for  all  the  delights 
that  were  mine  in  the  world ;  now  do  I  own,  mild  Crea- 
tor, most  need  that  Thou  give  good  to  my  ghost,  whereby 
my  soul  may  depart  unto  Thee  in  Thy  kingdom.  Prince 
of  (the)  angels,  may  fare  forth  in  peace ;  I  am  suppli- 
ant to  Thee  that  the  hell-foes  may  humble  it  not." 

Then  the  heathen  men  hewed  him  nnd  both  the  chief- 
tains that  stood  by  him  ;  ^Ifnod  and  Wulfmser  lay  slain ; 
by  the  side  of  their  prince  they  parted  with  life. 

And  hereupon  —  as  the  next  hundred  and  twenty-five 
lines  go  on  to  relate  —  there  was  like  to  be  a  most  sor- 
rowful panic  on  the  English  side.  Several  cowards  fled : 
notably  one  Godric,  who  leaped  upon  Byrhtnoth's  own 
horse,  and  so  cast  many  into  dead  despair  with  the  be- 
lief that  they  saw  —  what  no  man  had  ever  dreamed  he 
saw  before  —  Byrthnoth  in  flight.  But  presently  ^Elfwine 
and  Offa  and  other  high-souled  thanes  heartened  each 
other  and  led  up  their  people,  yet  to  no  avail ;  and  so 
thane  after  thane  and  man  after  man  fell  for  the  love  of 
Byrhtnoth  and  of  manhood,  and  no  more  would  flee. 
Finally  (at  line  309,  after  which  there  are  but  sixteen 
lines  more  of  the  Fragment)  we  find  Byrhtwold,  an  old 
warrior,  sturdily  bearing  up  his  shield  and  waving  his 
ash  and  exhorting  the  few  that  remained,  beautifully 
crying  :  — 

"  Soul  be  the  scomfuUer,  heart  be  the  bolder,  front  be 
the  firmer,  the  fewer  we  grow  !  Here,  all  hewn,  lieth 
our  chieftain,  a  good  man  on  the  ground  ;  for  ever  let 
(one)  mourn  who  now  from  this  war-play  thuiketh  to 
wend.  I  am  old  of  life  ;  hence  will  I  not ;  for  now  by 
the  side  of  my  lord,  by  the  so-beloved  man,  I  am  minded 
to  lie  !  " 


158  Music  and   Poetry 

Then  yElhelgar's  son  (Godric)  the  warriors  all  to 
combat  urged  ;  oft  he  (a)  javelin  let  hurl  -  -  a  bale-spear 
—  upon  the  vikings ;  so  he  among  the  folk  went  fore- 
most, hewed  and  felled,  till  that  he  sank  in  fight ;  he  was 
not  that  Godric  who  fled  from  the  battle. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  159 


XI 

Chaucer  and  Shakspere.* 

The    Inter-Relations    of   "  A    Midsummer    Night's 
Dream,"  "  Hamlet,"   and  "  The  Tempest." 

I 

«  I  DO  not  need "  —  cries  Montaigne,  protesting 
against  platitude  —  "I  do  not  need  to  be  told  what 
death  and  pleasure  are  ;  "  and  the  greatness  of  Shakspere 
and  Chaucer  has  come  to  be  so  far  upon  the  same  scale 
with  death  and  pleasure  that  probably  every  student  of 
those  writers  must  have  felt  a  certain  inconvenience 
when  tempted  to  break  forth  in  that  new  access  of 
wonder  so  sure  to  arise  from  each  fresh  contact  with 
their  art,  in  remembering  that  all  general  remarks  upon 
them  have  probably  long  ago  become  platitudes. 

Never  so  fairly  as  at  this  moment  have  men  beheld 
that  miracle  of  art  which  reverses  the  whole  economy 
of  things  in  favor  of  the  artist  and  his  lover.  What 
with  the  work  of  the  Chaucer  Society,  of  the  Shakspere 
Societies,  and  of  multitudinous  individual  laborers  from 
Shirley  and  Rowe  to  Blake  and  Furness ;  together  with 

»  These  three  "  Chaucer  and  Shakspere  "  papers  are  from  the 
introduction  to  a  text-book  with  the  above  title  designed  by  Mr. 
Lanier,  for  students  of  English  Literature,  but  not  quite  completed, 
in  October,  iSSo. 


i6o  Music  and  Poetry 

a  thousand  siftings  and   crystallizations  such  as  can  be 
effected  only  by  the  agitations  of  long  debate  and  the 
quiet  solutions  of  time,  we  know  Chaucer  and  Shak- 
spere  so  much  better  than  their  wives  Philippa  and  Anne 
knew  them   that  we  could  certainly  have   given  those 
ladies  some  useful  hints.     In  this  intimacy  we  find  our- 
selves possessing,  indeed,  no  less  than  a  perfect  com- 
pensation against  that  grim  bind  of  the  laws  of  Nature 
which  so  wears  the  tissue  of  all  our  spirits.     That  death 
destroys,  that  time  dims,  that  force  decreases  with  the 
square  of  the  distance  :  these  laws  which  seem  to  have 
jurisdiction  everywhere,  and    to   determine  every  effort 
of  man  and  Nature,  we  rejoice  to  see   not  only  bend, 
but  go  backward  cap  in  hand,  before  the  divinity  of  our 
dear  masters.     For  the  societies  and  fine  labors  just  de- 
tailed are   living  proofs  that    death  has  created    these 
poets  better    than   Ufe    did,   that    time's    corrosion  has 
merely  etched  their  features  in  more  relief  upon  man's 
heart,  and  that  their  power,  in  defiance  of  all  the  mathe- 
matics of  radiation,  has  steadily  increased  with  the  in- 
creasing radius  of  its  sphere. 

The  figures  of  Chaucer  and  Shakspere,  in  thus  escap- 
ing the  limitations  of  historic  distance,  have  come  nearer 
to  each  other  as  well  as  nearer  to  us.  Their  forms 
have  grown  so  clear  that  we  seem  able  to  seat  them 
quite  palpably  side  by  side  in  our  own  room,  where 
a  man  may  kiss  both  their  hands  in  one  and  the  same 
reverence. 

And,  having  them  in  this  favorable  session,  we  can 
draw  them  on  to  discuss  the  same  topic,  and  can  take 
what  wisdom  we  have  capacity  for  in  studying  their 
poetic  personalities  thus  sharply  relieved  upon  each 
other.      For    instance,    a    comparative    study    of    The 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  i6i 

Clerk's  Talc  (patient  Griselda's  story)  with  The  Tem- 
pest, both  of  which  are  motived  upon  Forgiveness,  may 
show  us  Chaucer  very  keenly  projected  upon  Shakspere. 
There  are  three  singularly  representative  works  of 
Shakspere  which,  by  their  remarkable  relatioHS  to  each 
other  and  to  three  corresponding  works  of  Chaucer, — 
besides  their  intrinsic  qualities,  —  are  capable  of  such 
large  and  useful  applications,  in  our  present  system  of 
educational  training,  to  the  furtherance  of  language, 
of  art,  and  of  morals,  that  it  has  seemed  a  plain  service 
to  set  them  forth  compactly  together,  in  original  and 
complete  forms,  and  with  such  helps  as  a  considerable 
experience  has  shown  necessary  to  make  them  available 
to  a  large  number  of  readers.  These  six  works  are  : 
A  Midsutnmer  Night's  Dream  herein  studied  in  conjunc- 
tion with  Chaucer's  Knighfs  Tale ;  Havilet  with  The 
Pardoner's  Tale,-  and  The  Tempest  with  The  Clerk's 
Tale. 

A  remarkable  set  of  circumstances  and  connexions 
combine  about  these  three  plays  of  Shakspere  to  make 
them  representative  of  three  great  Phases  or  Periods 
through  which  the  process  of  every  healthy  man's 
growth  naturally  passes.  If  we  consider  in  outline  the 
general  cycle  of  this  process,  it  will  become  easy  to  un- 
derstand the  extraordinary  manner  in  which  (i)  the 
Moral  Views,  (2)  the  Actual  Dates,  and  (3)  the  Artistic 
Structure  of  these  three  plays  converge  to  illustrate  it. 
If  this  inquiry  involves  us  for  a  moment  in  the  common- 
place, we  need  not  be  surprised  ;  for  it  is  by  virtue  of 
this  very  commonplaceness  that  the  works  named  have 
become  typic  and  of  universal  attraction.  We  shall, 
however,  quickly  arrive  at  less  open  ground. 

II 


1 62  Music  and  Poetry 

Let  one  remind  one's  self —  to  begin  —  how  youth,  or 
early  manhood,  with  its  debonair  waving-off  of  the  more 
terrible  questions  of  existence  in  favor  of  those  imme- 
diate joys  which  are  rendered  possible  by  the  physical 
luxuriance  of  this  period,  succeeds  for  a  while  in  main- 
taining toward  real  life  an  attitude  of  nonchalance  and 
irresponsibility.  It  is,  as  to  the  Real,  an  amateur 
period. 

Life  says  to  the  young  man,  as  the  artist  often  says  to 
some  dilettante  painter  or  musician  whom  the  iron  con- 
science which  makes   art  has  not  laid  under  its  awful 
obligations,    very  good,    adding    under   breath,  for   an 
amateur.     Or,  from  another  point  of  view,  youth  is  a 
period  armed  with   certain  qualities    which  act   toward 
all  facts  of  Death,   of  Question,   of  the    Disagreeable, 
as    the  large   green   leaf  to  the  round   drops   of  water 
which,  though  falling  fairly  upon  it,  do  but  roll  along  over 
it  in  globules,  without    breaking,  and  without   wetting 
the  leaf-tissue.     To  the  young  man  standing  at  the  door, 
waiting  for   Angela,  of  a    spring   morning,    when   sun, 
dew,  grass,  trees,  winding  woods,  river-stretches,  birds, 
love,  delight,  call  him  out  like  a  crowd  of  gay  compan- 
ions, it  is  little  impressive  to  insist  that  the  grass  there 
is  really  in  desperate  struggle,  blade  against  blade,  and 
grass  against  tree,  for  life,  and  that  the  very  bird  now 
alighting  on  the  sward  —  picture  of  innocence  !  is  on  a 
mission  of  murder  to  the  worm  it  is  swallowing.     His 
ear  may  hear  these  words,  but  they  roll  off.     What  if  it 
is?  he  says;  lifts  Angela  into  the  saddle,  mounts  by  her 
side,  and  these    two,   riding   close    together,   presently 
sweep  round  the  curve  of  the  road  and  are  lost  among 
the  trees.     To  him,   Life    has   not    revealed    its  whole 
self  yet;   and  what  is  more,   cannot    reveal  it.     Is   it 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  163 

too  much  to  say  that  Nature  has,  of  purpose,  physi- 
cally incapacitated  youth  for  the  sight  of  her  entire 
Form  ? 

Or  if  indeed  the  sensitive  soul  of  a  youth  is  impressed 
with  the  dread  revelations  of  the  underlying  reality  of 
things,  it  is  so  impressed  with  a  saving  clause,  —  namely, 
with  a  certain  curious  doubt  which  appears  to  brood 
beneficially  about  our  dreams.  The  most  painful  of 
dreams  affect  us  but  little  in  comparison  with  slight 
actual  griefs.  We  lose  our  wives,  we  commit  crimes, 
we  are  assailed  with  nameless  terrors,  in  the  visions  of 
the  night :  but  it  would  seem  that  the  soul  instinctively 
takes  things  with  a  certain  Pickwickian  perhaps,  at 
these  times.  No  one's  heart  was  ever  broken  by  a 
dream. 

And  this  dream-relation  of  youth  toward  the  Real 
brings  us  immediately  to  our  point ;  for  it  is  precisely 
such  a  relation  which  the  Midsutnmer  Nighfs  Dream 
expresses  in  the  most  ravishing  terms  of  fancy.  Death, 
and  the  cross  of  love,  and  the  downward  suctions  of 
trade  and  politics,  and  the  solemn  stillness  of  current 
criticisms  in  all  ages,  and  the  compromise  of  creed,  and 
the  co-existence  of  God  and  misery,  and  the  insufficiency 
of  provision  whereby  some  must  die  that  the  rest  may 
live,  and  a  thousand  like  matters  :  to  these  things  the 
youth's  senses,  made  purposely  unapprehensive  in  part, 
are  in  a  state  which  is  described  with  scientific  accuracy 
when  it  is  called  the  state  of  a  dream  ;  and  this  is  the 
state  revealed  in  the  Midsummer Nighf s  Drea?n.  Here 
we  have  the  cross  of  love  —  two  mad  for  one,  Obe- 
ron  quarrelling  with  his  wife  ;  but  no  thought  of  heart- 
break. Here  Bottom  and  his  fellow  patches  show  us 
Shakspere   conscious   of    the    fashionable    degradations 


164  Music  and   Poetry 

of  his  art ;  but  there  is  no  mourning  over  it,  as  in  the 
later  sonnet,  "  Tired  of  all  these,  for  restful  death  I 
cr}',"  and  several  others.  Here  we  have  the  stupid  ass- 
worship  of  contemporary  criticism  in  all  times  —  Titania, 
or  current  applause,  doting  upon  the  absurd  monster ; 
but  it  is  matter  for  smiles,  only,  not  indignation.  Cer- 
tainly,  Wrong  is  abroad,  that  is  clear ;  but  meantime  one 
is yoting ;  and  this  is  a  dream:  such  appears  to  be  the 
fair  moral  outcome  of  this  play. 

Now,  if  we  examine  this  work  further  with  reference 
to  the  actual  date  at  which  Shakspere  wrote  it,  and 
with  reference  to  the  quality  of  the  artistic  technic  he 
displays  in  it,  we  shall  find  both  these  particulars  bear- 
ing out  the  idea  of  youthfulness  in  the  most  striking 
manner.  But  reserving  this  examination  a  moment,  for 
the  sake  of  the  advantage  gained  in  consecutively  trac- 
ing Shakspere's  advance  in  moral  scope  through  the 
other  two  plays  mentioned  :  let  us  now  inquire  how  far 
the  attitude  of  the  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  toward 
things  has  been  changed  by  the  time  we  reach  Hamlet. 

Hamlet,  as  compared  with  A  Midsummer  Nighfs 
Dream  is  as  much  as  to  say,  ten  years  later.  Here  the 
ills  and  wrongs  which  youth  admits  in  a  theoretical 
sense  not  at  all  interfering  with  one's  gayety,  have  come 
upon  our  poet  in  the  shape  of  actual  matters  :  as  they  do 
come,  one  way  or  another,  to  every  man  soon  after  his 
manhood.  Immediately  in  his  path  young  Shakspere 
finds  a  grave  ;  it  is  so  real  that  a  voice  appears  to  come 
out  of  it,  saying,  either  explaiji  me  or  fill  me.  Here 
also,  sitting  on  either  side  the  ugly  hole,  are  the  two  fig- 
ures of  Sin  and  Punishment ;  and  a  multitude  of  less 
definite  shapes  flit  terribly  about.  No  debonair  waving 
away  of  these  now  into  the  vague  recesses  of  youthful 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  165 

unconcern.  Once  for  all,  death  and  crime  and  revenge 
and  insanity  and  corruption  are,  and  I  hav^e  personal 
relations  to  them.  For  the  first  time  he  realizes  the 
Real. 

Every  man  of  forty,  many  a  man  of  thirty,  knows  this 
phase.  If  we  call  that  of  youth  the  Dream  Period,  we 
may  designate  this  as  the  Real  Period.  It  comes  after 
one  has  seen  the  frightful  shifts  of  his  fellow-tradesmen, 
or  fellow- politicians,  or,  alas,  fellow-artists ;  or  after 
one  has  deadened  to  some  love,  of  wife,  child,  or 
mother,  found  unworthy,  and  therefore  loved  by  grace 
and  not  by  attractive  necessity;  or  after  one  has  by 
turns  begged,  threatened,  and  wept  in  the  face  of  death, 
at  the  parting  of  one's  best-loved,  and  found  oneself 
scorned  with  the  scorn  of  death's  imperturbable  Noth- 
ing ;  or  from  one  of  a  thousand  other  directions.  Turn 
which  way  one  will,  there  is  the  Devil  grinning.  The 
most  familiar  references  show  us  the  universality  of 
this  phase  ;  it  crops  out  from  all  Bibles,  histories,  biogra- 
phies ;  the  eating  of  the  fruit  which  brought  the  knowl- 
edge of  good  and  evil;  the  giving  over  of  Job  into 
Satan's  hands,  the  Temptation  in  the  wilderness,  the 
sequestration  of  Moses,  the  hideous  groans  of  Mohammed, 
the  cry  for  the  actual  truth  at  the  Renascence,  the  rise 
of  Science :  these  all  occur  in  each  life,  and  represent 
from  various  standpoints  the  condition  of  Shakspere's 
mind  which  expressed  itself  in  the  play  of  Hamlet. 
Again  postponing  for  a  moment  the  parallel  questions  of 
actual  date  and  artistic  advance  :  let  us  pursue  the  mat- 
ter of  moral  growth  to  the  third  play  of  our  series,  The 
Tempest. 

Here  the  world  is  resolved.     Man  —  who  in  the  Mid- 
sujuyner   Night's    Dream    was    the  victim    of   Puck,  or 


i66  Music  and  Poetry 

tricksy  Chance,  and  the  slave  of  Nature  ;  ^  who,  in  Ham- 
let has  advanced  only  so  far  from  this  status  that  he  is 
inquiring  into  Nature,  puzzling  over  death,  analyzing 
revenge,  and  struggling  with  fate ;  —  is,  in  The  Tem- 
pest, ruler  of  Ariel  (Puck's  apotheosis),  and  lord  of  the 
storm,  (which  here  brings  good  instead  of  the  evil  of 
Titania's  freshets).  In  the  Dream  Period  man  is  the 
sport  of  fate  ;  in  the  Hamlet  period  man  is  still  be- 
neath fate,  but  the  thing  has  gone  beyond  sport,  for 
man  inquires  and  suffers  and  struggles ;  in  the  Tem- 
pest Period  man  is  master  of  the  universe.  And  —  what 
is  here  essential  —  this  masterhood  of  Nature  is  accom- 
panied by  a  supreme  moral  goodness  to  fellow-man. 
The  Tempest  is  motived  upon  an  enormous  Forgive- 
ness. The  whole  plot  is,  in  three  words,  a  stor?n  and 
a.  fairy,  used  as  servants  by  a  man  (Prosper©),  for  a  be- 
neficent purpose  which  embraces  in  its  scope  even  the 
man's  a'uelest  enemy. 

Out  of  the  Real,  or  Inquiring,  or  Scientific  (these 
terms  become  convertible  from  the  point  of  view  herein 
urged)  Period  of  Hamlet,  our  poet  emerges  into  what 
we  may  fairly  call,  by  a  nomenclature  based  on  logical 
extension  of  the  thought  started  with,  the  Ideal  Period 
of  The  Tempest. 

In  comparing  these  plays,  therefore,  with  reference  to 
the  moral  scope  of  the  view  of  life  which  they  present, 

1  Compare  Titania's  speech  in  Act  II.  Scene  2,  when,  after  the 

marvellous  picture  of  the  freshets  and  topsy-turvy  seasons,  she 

adds  : 

"  And  this  same  progeny  of  evils  comes 
From  our  debate,  from  our  dissension." 

But  all  the  details  of  this  preliminary  outline  of  the  relations  be- 
tween the  three  plays  will  appear  in  the  notes  accompanying  the 
representations  of  them  hereinafter  made. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  167 

we  have  arrived  at  a  set  of  inter-relations  which  may  be 
accurately  summed  up  in  the  following  scheme  : 


DREAM    PERIOD.  I     REAL    PERIOD. 
A   MIDSUMMER  HAMLET. 

NIGHT'S  DREAM.\ 


IDEAL   PERIOD. 
THE    TEMPEST. 


If,  now,  advancing  to  the  question  of  actual  dates,  we 
shall  find  that  all  the  plays  which  Shakspere  wrote 
between  about  1590  and  1602  ^  were  of  a  nature  to  show 
clearly  the  view  of  life  just  developed  as  characteristic 
of  his  first,  or  Dream,  Period,  while  those  written  be- 
tween about  1602  and  1608  arrange  themselves,  from  the 
same  point  of  view,  under  the  next,  or  Real,  Period  ;  and 
those  written  between  about  1608  and  16 13  (at  which 
latter  date  he  probably  stopped  writing,  three  years  be- 
fore his  death)  under  the  third,  or  Ideal,  Period :  we 
will  thus  uncover  a  process  of  spiritual  growth  so  nor- 
mal and  healthy  as  to  constitute  a  perfect  explanation  of 
the  astonishing  universality  with  which  Shakspere  ap- 
peals to  all  classes  of  men,  of  all  nations,  in  all  ages. 
For  we  here  discover  a  complete  and  simple  answer  to 
that  questioning  doubt  which  all  persons  feel  when  told 
that  such  and  such  plays  of  Shakspere's  embody  such 
and  such  ideals,  or  are  motived  upon  such  and  such  cen- 

1  Most  readers  of  a  work  so  general  as  this  would  find  any 
detailed  discussion  of  dates  exceedingly  irksome,  and  it  seems 
proper,  therefore,  to  support  the  chronology  here  advanced  only 
by  giving  such  reference  as  will  enable  those  desiring  further  re- 
search to  examine  the  evidence  for  themselves.  Altogether  the 
best  book  for  this  purpose  is  the  Chronological  Order  of  Shaksper^s 
Plays,  by  the  Rev.  II.  P.  Stokes,  Macmillan  &  Co.,  London,  1878, 
in  which  the  whole  body  of  evidence  is  admirably  collated,  and 
tables  are  arranged  showing  at  a  glance  the  conclusions  of  the 
main  workers  in  this  field.  The  dates  of  the  three  plays  specially 
considered  will  be  fully  treated  in  the  notes  accompanying  them. 


1 68  Music  and  Poetry 

tral  thoughts.  These  plays  seem  to  every  reader  so 
natural  ami  spontaneous  that  instant  revolt  is  excited  by 
every  assertion  of  special  meanings  in  them  implying 
deliberate  and  conscious  premeditation  on  Shakspere's 
part.  Pooh  !  one  is  inclined  to  say,  do  not  tell  vie  that 
Shakspere  tneant  to  portray  this  and  that  "  view "  of 
things  —  revenge  in  ^^  Hamlet,^'  forgiveness  in  ^' The 
Tempest;''  he  did  not  "mean'"  to  portray  anything. 
The  fact  was  simply  that  the  manager  wanted  a  play 
a?id  Shakspere  wanted  money,  and  the  latter,  being  called 
on  by  the  former,  wrote  whatever  first  came  in  mind ; 
hence  "  Hamlet''  and  "  The  Tempest"  and  all  the  rest. 

Now  this  is  mainly  true,  and  yet,  if  taken  in  connec- 
tion with  the  dates  just  advanced  and  the  considerations 
preceding  them,  it  is  a  truth  which  results  very  differ- 
ently from  what  the  hasty  thinker  would  suspect.  For 
the  outcome  of  it  is  to  produce  a  correspondence  be- 
tween every  work  of  Shakspere's  and  the  whole  state 
of  his  soul  at  the  moment  when  that  work  was  produced, 
which  would  amount  to  a  more  complete  unity  of  "  view  " 
than  any  deliberate  and  conscious  premeditation  what- 
ever could  effect.  It  is  design  that  has  designed  itself. 
If  we  say  that  Hamlet  represents  the  Real  period  of 
Shakspere's  growth,  we  do  not  affirm  that  Shakspere 
sat  down  one  day  and  said  to  himself:  Come  now,  I 
will  write  a  play  which  shall  picture  a  soul  dealing  with 
dark  questions ;  but  we  affirm  that  Shakspere  one  day 
sat  down  to  write,  —  incited  thereto  by  whatever  per- 
sonal motive,  money  or  what  not,  —  and  that  the  day 
happened  to  be  one  of  a  season  when  his  own  mind  was 
or  had  been  dealing  with  dark  questions ;  now,  when  he 
wrote,  he  wrote  with  all  that  was  within  him,  and  affected 
nothing ;  hence  Hamlet. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  169 

Thus  the  question  of  Shakspere  chronology,  which 
many  are  at  first  incUned  to  class  among  the  driest  and 
most  useless  of  antiquarian  discussions,  becomes  a  mat- 
ter of  the  freshest  living  interest,  —  a  matter  touching  the 
highest  questions  of  religion  and  the  spirit. 

It  must  be,  therefore,  that  every  one  who  has  not  be- 
fore studied  this  question  will  feel  a  certain  delightful 
shock  of  revelation  in  finding  that  a  perfectly  sober 
chronology  —  a  chronology  lying  fairly  at  the  focus  of  all 
the  numerous  rays  of  evidence  uncovered  by  the  loving 
industry  of  Shakspere  students  —  authorizes  the  con- 
struction of  a  scheme  like  the  following,  which  I  have 
arranged  for  the  purpose  of  enabling  the  reader  to  sweep 
at  a  glance  along  the  whole  spiral  of  Shakspere's  orbit 
so  far  as  it  was  visible  from  our  planet :  — 

DREAM  PERIOD  :  ABOUT  1590-1602. 
All  the  light  comedies,  such  as 

Love's  Labor  Lost,  As  You  Like  It,  etc. 
All  the  historical  plays,  such  as 

Richard  IIL,  the  Henry  series,  etc.,  except  Henry  VHL,  a 

Forgiveness  play,  coining  in  the   Third    Period.    Romeo  and 

Juliet. 

REPRESENTATIVE  PLAY  OP   THIS  PERIOD, 
A  MIDSUMMER  NIGHT'S  DREAM. 

REAL   PERIOD:    ABOUT    1602-1608. 

All  the  dark  tragedies,  such  as 

Macbeth,  Othello,  King  Lear,  and  the  like. 

REPRESENTATIVE  PLAY  OF    THIS  PERIOD, 
HAMLET. 

IDEAL   PERIOD:    ABOUT  1608-1613. 

All  Till-  Forgiveness  and  Reconciliation  Plays,  such  as 
Winter's  Tate,  Henry  VIII.,  and  tlie  like. 

REPRESENTATIVE  PLAY  OF    THIS  PERIOD, 
THE    TEMPEST. 


lyo  Music  and   Poetry 

The  most  cursory  inspection  of  this  scheme  shows 
how  completely  the  plays  thus  belonging  together  ac- 
cording to  their  dates  also  belong  together  accord- 
ing to  their  moral  conceptions  of  life,  (a)  First  the 
sportive  comedies  explicitly  play  with  life.  ((J)  Then 
the  historical  plays,  even  in  setting  forth  wrong  and 
treachery  and  grief,  do  not  investigate  the  why  of  them. 
We  have  the  recognition  of  Pain  in  life,  but  no  inquiry 
into  its  nature  and  function  in  the  economy  of  the  world, 
(r)  And  in  Romeo  and  Juliet  the  darkness  of  death  is 
used  merely  as  a  foil  to  set  off  the  brilliance  of  pure 
young  Passion,  as  jewellers  lay  a  diamond  upon  black 
velvet. 

In  short,  all  these  plays  {a,  b,  c),  buoyant  with  youth, 
recognize  the  Inequalities  of  Things  only  to  skip  over 
them,  and  all  the  more  fun,  for  who  likes  the  fiats? 
Clearly,  in  the  plays  of  this  time  the  perplexity  and  black 
contradiction  of  life  have  not  arisen  before  Shakspere 
as  facts  to  which  he  (Shakspere)  has  personal  rela- 
tions demanding  settlement  and  action.  When  these 
facts  appear,  they  appear  as  in  a  dream. 

It  seems  therefore  a  broad  and  strictly  scientific  gen- 
eralization by  which  all  these  works  from  1590  to  1602 
may  be  classed,  to  regard  them  as  penetrated  with  the 
spirit  of  youth  or  young  manhood,  and  as  accurately 
represented  by  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dreajn. 

Thus  the  First  Period,  in  date,  and  the  Dream  Period, 
in  conception,  coincide.  But,  again,  if  without  reference 
to  their  plots  or  conceptions  we  find  that  in  point  of  fact 
Macbeth  and  limon  and  Othello  and  the  others  are  writ- 
ten all  together ;  and,  if  upon  examining  them,  we  find 
that  they  all  concur  in  showing  a  spirit  of  scientific  inquiry 
into  wrong,  superadded  to  those  mere  passionate  invec- 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere 


171 


tives  against  it  which  occur  in  the  histories ;  we  are  justi- 
fied in  saying  that  the  Second  Period,  as  to  date,  and  the 
Real  Period,  as  to  conception,  coincide. 

And  so,  finally,  The  Tempest  and  Winto's  Tale  and 
the  others,  motived  upon  Forgiveness  and  Reconcilia- 
tion, and  written  after  1608,  put  us  upon  the  coincidence 
of  the  Third,  and  the  Ideal,  periods. 

As  the  mind  runs  rapidly  along  the  plots  of  the  plays 
which  are  here  indicated  in  the  briefest  possible  terms, 
the  proposition  grows  clear  that  if  —  as  is  highly  prob- 
able from  the  evidence  which  will  be  hereinafter  pointed 
out  in  connection  with  various  passages  when  the  plays 
are  separately  treated  —  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream 
was  written  about  1593-4  or  -5,  Hamlet  about  1602, 
and  The  Tempest  about  161 1,  then  these  three  plays  — 
so  representative,  as  already  shown,  of  a  normal  advance 
in  breadth  of  moral  conception  —  really  constitute  a 
historic  as  well  as  logical  formula  of  Shakspere's  growth. 
This  formula  we  can  embody  in  an  abstract  of  all  the 
preceding  considerations,  thus  : 


DREAM    PERIOD: 
1 590-1602. 

Represented  by 

A   MIDSUMMER 

NIGHT'S  ORE  AM. 


REAL   PERIOD; 
1602-1608. 

Represented  by 
HAMLET. 


IDEAL    PERIOD; 

1608-1613. 

Represented  by 

THE    TEMPEST. 


II 

Having  thus  established  that  the  moral  advance  so 
clear  in  these  three  plays  is  actually  the  historic  advance 
of  Shakspere's  unfolding  spirit,  we  may  now  go  on  to  a 
third  series  of  considerations  which  not  only  support  this 
conclusion  but  enlarge  it  into  a  most  striking  view  of 


172  Music  and  Poetry 

the  symmetry  of  the  poet's  growth  throughout  the  whole 
mass  of  his  powers.  We  have  seen  his  growth  in  moral 
compass  ;  let  us  now  see  if  a  growth  in  artistic  com- 
pass proceeded  —  as  of  course  it  should  in  every  sym- 
metrical and  healthy  development  —  along  with  the 
other. 

This  investigation  is  capable  of  being  conducted  with 
a  scientific  accuracy  which  secures  such  valuable  results 
that  probably  the  most  cursory  reader  will  not  object  to 
some  brief  description  of  the  simple  apparatus  of  terms 
and  principles  used  for  that  purpose.  To  this  end,  let 
us  for  a  moment  consider  the  formal  art  of  the  poet  in 
general  from  a  standpoint  somewhat  higher  than  that 
usually  occupied.  It  is  not  difficult  to  find  one  com- 
manding such  a  field  of  view  that  we  can  see  the  moral 
and  the  artistic  presenting  themselves  as  really  parts  of 
a  continuous  line,  different  enough  at  the  extremes,  but 
as  inseparable  at  the  middle  as  is  plant  life  from  animal 
life  in  certain  lower  forms  of  being.  This  remark  is, 
however,  in  anticipation. 

Since  concrete  instances  will  here  be  at  once  more 
clear  and  more  interesting  than  any  abstract  develop- 
ment of  principles,  let  us  obtain  familiarity  with  the  ap- 
paratus just  referred  to,  by  at  once  beginning  to  use  it. 
Selecting  two  representative  passages  from  the  extremes 
of  the  whole  period  of  Shakspere's  work,  that  is,  one 
from  the  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  (1595?),  and 
one  from  The  Te7?ipest  (16 12— 13),  I  ask  the  reader 
to  utter  them  aloud  and  to  observe  the  actual  phenom- 
ena which  occur.  For  one  of  such  representative  pas- 
sages, let  us  take  the  following  from  the  Midsummer 
Nighfs  Dream,  and  consider  it  a  moment  before  its 
fellow-passage  from  The  Tempest. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  173 

"  Love  looks  not  with  the  eyes  but  with  the  mind ; 
And  therefore  is  wing'd  Cupid  painted  blind  : 
Nor  hath  Love's  mind  of  any  judgment  taste  ; 
Wings  and  no  eyes  figure  unheedy  haste  : 
And  therefore  is  Love  said  to  be  a  child. 
Because  in  choice  he  is  so  oft  beguil'd." 

Upon  reciting  this  passage  aloud,  perhaps  the  first  and 
most  striking  observation  is  that  between  the  last  word 
of  each  line  and  the  first  word  of  the  next  line  the  voice 
made  a  distinct  pause  much  longer  than  the  pause  be- 
tween any  two  consecutive  words  in  the  body  of  any  one 
line.  The  voice,  in  short,  divided  off  the  whole  passage 
into  six  smaller  passages  for  the  ear  just  as  the  punctua- 
tion marks  and  the  verse-method  of  printing  divide  it 
off  into  six  smaller  passages  —  that  is,  six  "  lines  "  — for 
the  eye. 

What  is  the  effect  of  this  sixfold  division?  Let  it  be 
recalled  that  in  listening  to  uttered  speech,  although  the 
primary  constituents  of  that  speech  are  what  we  may 
call  alphabetic  sounds,  or  letter-sounds,  yet  the  ear,  at 
the  same  time  that  it  pays  attention  to  these  letter- 
sounds  individually,  also  pays  attention  to  them  in  those 
little  groups  or  discrete  masses  called  "  syllables."  For 
example,  in  hearing  the  first  word  of  this  passage,  the 
ear  consciously  hears  first  the  sound  of  L,  then  that  of  o, 
then  that  of  v;  but  the  whole  discrete  mass  Love  has 
nevertheless  struck  the  ear  in  such  quick  succession  as 
to  be  practically  simultaneous,  and  the  separate  sounds 
have  much  the  same  individual  effect  with  that  of  each 
separate  tone  in  a  chord  of  three  tones  struck  on  the 
piano.  The  ear,  therefore,  in  hearing  the  sounds  of 
speech,  practically  hears  them  in  little  chords,  or  groups, 
each  group  being  that  discrete  mass  of  tone  called  a 
syllable. 


174  Music  and  Poetry 

From  this  grouping,  commonplace  as  it  seems,  pro- 
ceed the  most  remarkable  effects.  If  we  analyze  the 
passage  just  read  by  letter-soimds,  the  most  hopeless 
confusion  results :  we  can  trace  no  law  among  the 
series  of  sounds.  But  if  we  analyze  it  by  syllables,  and 
agree  (for  reasons  not  proper  to  be  detailed  here,  but 
which  any  curious  reader  will  find  detailed  in  the  au- 
thor's Science  of  English  Verse,  pp.  59  and  following) 
to  call  such  syllables  "  verse-sounds,"  we  will  find  that 
there  are  in  the  passage  read  exactly  sixty  of  these  verse- 
sounds.  The  effect  of  the  division  into  six  smaller  pas- 
sages or  lines  by  the  pause  at  the  end  of  each  line  — 
which  pause  we  may  here  conveniently  agree  to  call  the 
"end-stop"  —  may  now  be  clearly  seen,  when,  upon 
analyzing  the  first  line  by  verse-sounds  (here  easily  done 
because  each  word  happens  to  be  one  discrete  syllable 
and  to  constitute,  therefore,  one  verse-sound), 

I       2       3456789      10 
"I^ve  looks  not  with  the  eyes  but  with  the  mind," 

we  discover  that  it  consists  of  exactly  ten  such  verse- 
sounds,  and,  pursuing  the  analysis,  that  the  second  line 

I         2345        6789      10 
"  And  there-fore  is  wing'd  Cu-pid  paint-ed  blind," 

consists  also  of  exactly  ten  such  verse-sounds,  and  so 
with  each  of  the  others.  Thus  the  whole  passage  reveals 
itself  from  this  point  of  view  as  a  large  group  of  sixty 
verse-sounds,  divided  into  six  smaller  groups  of  ten 
verse-sounds  each. 

Here  the  ear  has  the  pleasure  of  perceiving  that  in  a 
great  mass  of  tones  —  which  taken  by  letter-sounds  is 
absolutely  patternless,  relationless,  and  lawless  —  there  is 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  175 

nevertheless  a  definite  pattern  which  runs  through  the 
whole  mass,  a  definite  law  which  reduces  the  whole  con- 
fusion to  a  clear  and  simple  order,  a  set  of  relations 
which  binds  together  all  the  individual  constituents  of 
the  mass. 

Before  going  on  to  develop  the  ear's  further  manage- 
ment of  these  patterns,  it  is  worth  while  remarking  that 
we  have  here  come  upon  a  principle  which  not  only 
seems  to  lie  at  the  bottom  of  all  human  delight  in,  and 
desire  for,  rhythmic  poetry,  but  which  equally  inspires 
every  scientific  generalization  and  every  formation  of 
moral  law.  We  have  just  seen  that  upon  presenting  to 
the  ear  a  long  series  of  letter-sounds,  the  ear,  while  ap- 
preciating them  as  letter-sounds,  eagerly  accepts  the 
first  indication  that  this  lawless  series  is  capable  of  an 
arrangement  which  is  not  lawless,  eagerly  perceives  the 
relations  between  the  verse-sounds  just  detailed,  and 
traces  with  delight  the  pattern  of  tens  and  sixes  into 
which  it  finds  the  verse-sounds  are  woven.  This  strin- 
gent search  after  pattern,  relation,  law,  among  confused 
sounds,  this  intolerance  of  chaos  (or  un-relation),  this 
delight  upon  discovering  a  principle  which  arranges  ap- 
parently unrelated  particulars  into  an  interdependent  sys- 
tem,—  would  seem  to  be  at  bottom  the  same  presiding 
passion  which  fills  the  scientific  searcher  with  discontent, 
when  he  has  accumulated  a  number  of  scientific  facts, 
until  he  finds  some  pattern,  some  principle  of  relation, 
some  law,  which  binds  together  those  facts  just  as  the 
patterns  of  tens  and  sixes,  the  relation  of  ten  and  six  to 
sixty,  the  law  of  grouping  by  groups  of  ten  verse-sounds 
into  six  subordinate  groups,  bound  together  the  whole 
mass  of  otherwise  chaotic  letter-sounds  into  the  organic 
and  related  whole  of  the  verse-structure. 


176  Music  and  Poetry 

And  lastly  this  same  passion  appears  to  act  upon 
moral  facts  just  as  upon  scientific  facts,  and  to  cause  the 
moralist  to  search  eagerly  along  any  accumulation  of 
moral  details  for  some  pattern,  or  relation,  or  law,  which 
shall  dispose  them  all  into  order. 

We  shall  presently  find  this  observation  of  great  prac- 
tical use ;  but  reserving  it  for  a  further  stage  of  the 
inquiry,  let  us  now  proceed  with  the  study  of  the  verse- 
phenomena. 

We  found  that  it  was  the  pause  at  the  end  of  each  line, 
or  "end-stop,"  which  was  the  active  agent  in  marking 
off  for  the  ear  the  six  constituent  groups  into  which  our 
sixty  verse-sounds  were  divided.  Thus  it  is  easy  to  see 
that  the  "  end-stopped  line,"  or  line  admitting  a  pause 
of  voice  between  it  and  the  next  line,  is  a  controlling 
factor  in  the  construction  of  what  we  shall  have  frequent 
occasion  to  call  the  Regular  System  (for  there  is,  as  will 
presently  be  detailed,  in  all  musical  verse,  an  equally 
important  series  of  factors  forming  an  Irregular  System) 
of  verse.  This  function  of  the  end-stopped  line  becomes 
perfectly  clear  upon  observing  the  precisely  opposite 
function  of  the  line  which  is  not  end-stopped,  the  line 
which,  by  the  close  connexion  of  its  last  word  with  the 
first  word  of  the  next  line  forcibly  runs  the  reader's 
voice  on  to  that  first  word,  and  which  from  this  effect  is 
called  the  "  run-on  line."  For  example,  if  the  following 
passage  from  Alonzo's  speech  in  Act  II.  Scene  i .  of  The 
Tempest  be  recited  aloud, 

"  You  cram  these  words  into  mine  ears  against 
The  stomach  of  my  sense.     Would  I  had  never 
Married  my  daughter  there  !  "  .  . 

the  sense  of  the  end-word  in  each  of  the  first  two  lines 
is  found  to  be  so  closely  connected  with  that  of  the  fol- 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  177 

lowing  word  at  the  beginning  of  the  next  line  that  the 
voice  must  run  on  from  one  to  the  other ;  and  thus  the 
ear  of  a  hearer  is  not  advised  of  the  termination  of  each 
line  by  the  recurrent  pause,  or  end-stop.  Thus  the  run- 
on  line  becomes,  in  its  turn,  a  controlling  factor  in  what 
we  will  have  frequent  occasion  to  refer  to  as  the  Irregu- 
lar System,  —  a  system  which  every  maker  of  verse  must 
construct,  to  move  along  with  the  Regular  System  and 
prevent  the  latter  from  cloying  the  ear  and  from  offend- 
ing the  sense  of  proportion  by  its  stiffness. 

Let  us  now  pause  for  a  moment  at  this  point  in  our 
study  of  the  phenomena  presented  by  the  passage 
from  Midsuiruner  Nighfs  Dream,  and  before  going  on 
to  observe  others,  let  us  inquire  how  these  two  great 
classes  of  lines  —  the  end-stopped  and  the  run-on  — 
were  regarded  by  Shakspere  at  the  two  periods  respec- 
tively of  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  and  The 
Tempest.  It  is  evident  upon  the  slightest  reflection 
that  the  predominance  of  one  or  the  other  of  these 
kinds  of  lines  in  a  verse-structure  would  strikingly  charac- 
terize its  nature.  If  the  end-stopped  line  should  largely 
prevail,  the  verse  would  be  very  rigidly  marked  off  into 
lines  for  the  ear,  and  the  structure  would  be  simple  and 
clear  at  the  expense  of  being  stiff.  If  on  the  other 
hand  the  run-on  lines  should  prevail,  the  structure 
would  be  varied  and  interesting  at  the  expense  of  be- 
coming less  intelligible  to  the  ear  in  pattern. 

Now  upon  counting  the  number  of  end-stopped  and 
run-on  lines  respectively  in  Shakspere's  earlier  plays, 
and  comparing  their  proportion  with  the  proportion  of 
end-stopped  to  run-on  lines  in  his  later  plays,  it  is 
found  that  in  the  earliest  plays  he  used  the  end-stopped 
line   (Regular  System)   almost  exclusively,  but  that  he 

12 


lyS  Music  and   Poetry 

began  very  soon  to  perceive  the  need  of  the  run-on  line 
to  vary  the  monotonous  regularity  of  the  other,  and 
thenceforward  used  it  (thus  bringing  forward  the  rela- 
tive importance  of  the  Irregular  System)  with  increas- 
ing frequency  until  the  latest  plays.  These  proportions 
have  been  formulated  quite  exactly  in  tables  containing 
the  percentages  of  run-on  and  end-stopped  lines,  which 
the  reader  will  probably  find  most  easily  accessible  in 
Mr.  Edward  Dowden's  delightful  Shakspere  Primer 
(Macmillan  &  Co.,  London  and  New  York).  For  ex- 
ample, disregarding  small  fractions  for  the  sake  of 
brevity :  in  the  T^vo  Gentletnefi  of  Verona,  an  early 
play,  are  but  about  one-tenth  as  many  run-on  as  end- 
stopped  lines ;  while  in  The  Tempesi,  which  we  have 
seen  to  be  a  late  play,  the  run-on  lines  have  in- 
creased to  about  one-third  as  many  as  the  end-stopped, 
and  the  character  of  the  verse  is  so  changed  as  to 
impress  every  ear :  it  has  acquired  a  carriage  greatly 
larger  and  more  sweeping.  Between  other  plays  lying 
at  the  extremes  of  the  periods  given,  the  proportion 
is  still  greater.  Thus  —  in  the  Cofnedy  of  Errors,  an 
early  play  —  the  proportion  of  run-on  lines  is  only  about 
one  in  eleven ;  while  in  Cymbeline  —  a  play  of  The 
Tempest  period  —  the  proportion  has  risen  to  about 
one  in  two  and  a  half:  that  is  to  say,  there  are  about 
four  and  a  half  times  as  many  run-on  lines  in  the  late 
play  as  in  the  early  one.  Still  more  striking  is  the 
difference  between  the  early  (possibly  the  first)  play. 
Love's  Labor's  Lost,  and  the  late  play,  the  Winter's 
Tale :  for  the  proportion  in  the  first  is  one  run-on 
to  18.14  end-stopped  lines,  while  in  the  latter  it  is  one 
to  2.12  :  that  is  to  say.  Winter's  Tale  contains  a 
proportion  of  about  nine  times  as  many  run-on  lines  (or 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  179 

nine  times  as  much  of  the  Irregular  System)  as  Love's 
Labor  ^s  Lost. 

The  increase  in  the  use  of  run-on  lines  thus  so  consis- 
tently characterizing  Shakspere's  later  plays  holds  per- 
fectly good  with  reference  to  the  two  we  are  specially 
studying.  In  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  we  find 
the  proportion  of  run-on  lines  to  that  of  end-stopped 
to  be  greatly  less  —  that  is,  the  verse  to  be  greatly 
less  free  —  than  in  The  Tempest. 

Observing  only  for  the  present  that  the  advance  in 
Shakspere's  artistic  technic  here  indicated  is  always 
an  advance  in  the  direction  of  the  Irregular  System, 
that  is,  in  the  direction  of  Freedom,  Largeness,  and 
Grace  :  let  us  now  recur  to  the  two  passages  under  study. 

If  we  examine  that  from  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream, 

"  Love  looks  not  with  the  eyes  but  with  the  mind  ; 
And  therefore  is  wing'd  Cupid  painted  blind; 
Nor  hath  Love's  mind  of  any  judgment  taste  ; 
Wings  and  no  eyes  figure  unheedy  haste ; 
And  therefore  is  Love  said  to  be  a  child, 
Because  in  choice  he  is  so  oft  beguil'd," 

we  will  find  that  three  very  striking  particulars,  all  con- 
nected with  the  end  of  each  of  these  lines,  call  the  ear's 
attention  thereto  in  such  a  way  as  to  re-enforce  the  end- 
stop  in  its  effect,  and  to  make  the  line  division  very 
prominent  to  the  car.  These  three  particulars  are  :  (i) 
the  Rhyme,  which  concentrates  the  ear's  attention  upon 
the  last  word  in  every  line ;  (2)  the  Strong  Ending  of 
each  line,  or  important  word  capable  of  emphasis  in 
which  each  line  ends,  giving  a  markedly  different  effect 
from  that  of  Weak-ending  lines,  or  lines  in  which  the  last 
word  is  a  particle  like  afid,  if,  the,  but,  and  the  like,  as 

"  This  is  a  most  majestic  vision  and 
(larmonious  charmingly," 


i8o  Music  and   Poetry 

from  The  Tempest,  where  and  at  the  end  would  be 
more  likely  to  deceive,  than  to  advise,  the  ear  as  to  the 
true  ending  of  the  line;  and  (3)  the  Single  Ending,  or 
ending  in  one  verse-sound,  as  opposed  to  those  "  Double 
Ending,"  or  "  Feminine  Ending  "  lines,  which  end  in 
two  syllables  (to  be  pronounced  in  the  time  of  one), 
like,  for  example,  the  second  line  in  the  passage  first 
given  from  The  Tempest, 

"  The  stomach  of  my  sense.     Would  I  had  never" 

the  line  being  complete  at  the  syllable  "  nev  ;  "  or  like 
the  following,  also  from  The  Tempest,  where  the  double 
ending,  instead  of  being  two  syllables  of  one  word 
("Feminine  Ending")   is  two  words, 

"  Why,  as  I  told  thee,  't  is  a  custom  with  him," 

a  line  complete  at  the  word  "  with  "  and  preserving  its 
rhythmic  structure  only  through  the  utterance  of  the 
two  verse-sounds  "  with  him  "  in  the  same  time  as  one.^ 
We  may  conveniently  formulate  these  three  additional 
particulars  and  their  artistic  function,  as  follows  : 

REGULAR  SYSTEM.    IRREGULAR  SYSTEM. 

Rhymed  Lhies.  Blank  (Unrhymed)  Lines. 

Strong  Ending  Lines.  Weak  Ending  " 

Single  Ending    "  Double      )  Ending    " 

Feminine  ' 

Now  upon  examining  Shakspere's  plays  with  reference 
to  these  three  particulars,  and  counting  the  actual  respec- 
tive number  of  rhymes,  of  strong  endings,  and  of  single 
endings,  with  the  corresponding  numbers  of  blank-verse 

1  A  reader  desirous  of  pursuing  the  subject  will  find  these 
phenomena  reduced  to  terms  of  musical  notation  and  fully  ex- 
plained in  the  present  author's  Science  of  English  Verse,  pp.  201 
and  following. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  i8i 

(or  unrhymed)   lines,  of  weak  endings/  and  of  double 
endings :    the    same    general   advance   is  clear  towards 
freedom  and  variety;    that  is,  we  find  all  the   effects 
just  classified  under  the  head  of  the  Irregular  System 
growing  more  and  more  numerous  and   prominent,  and 
tending  more  and  more  to  vary  the  monotony  and  stiff- 
ness of  the  earlier  verse.     With  the  clear  conception 
then  that  Rhymes,  Strong  Endings,  and  Single  Endings 
powerfully  fix  the  ear's  attention  upon  the  end  of  each 
line  and  thus  powerfully  establish  the  great  Line-Rhyth- 
mus,  while  all   such  departures  from  this  normal  type, 
as  Blank  Endings,  Weak  Endings  and  Double  Endings, 
as  powerfully  vary  the  Rhythmic  flow  and  tend  to  dis- 
establish  the  same  great  Line-Rhythmus,  we  find  that 
in  the  late  plays  there  is  a  strong  and  notable  tendency 
to  the  latter,  and  that  the  general  proportion  of  blank 
or  unrhymed  verse,  of  weak  endings  and  of  double  end- 
ings, is  greatly  larger  in  the  plays  of  the  Ideal  Period 
than  in  those  of  the  Dream  Period.     It  would  be  out 
of  place   here  to  trace  all  these   proportions  with   any 
detail ;  and  so,  referring  the  reader  desirous  of  going 
farther  to  the  table  of  percentages  for  all  these  particu- 
lars which  may  be  conveniently  found  in  Stokes's  Chron- 
ology, already  cited,  let  us  consider  only  the  two  extremes 
of  the  Periods,  and  only  the  two   representative   plays 
we    have    been    studying.      ( i )    As   to    Rhymes :    The 
Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  presents  us  with  932  rhymed 
lines  in  a  total  of  2,251,  while  The  laiipest  presents  us 

1  The  sub-division  into  "weak"  and  "  liglit "  endings  is  not  of 
enough  importance  in  the  present  connection  to  be  worth  detail- 
ing, in  view  of  the  extreme  of  simplicity  desirable  in  such  a  de- 
monstration. Readers  will  find  it  set  forth  either  in  the  Shakspere 
Primer  or  The  Science  of  English  Verse,  already  cited. 


i82  Music  -And  Poetry 

with  only  98  (of  which  96  are  in  songs).  It  must  of 
course  be  remembered  that  this  rhyme  test  might 
easily  be  strained  out  of  its  province.  Special  occasion 
for  rhymes  might  exist  and  control  a  general  tendency. 
Of  the  general  tendency,  however,  to  disuse  rhymes  in 
Shakspere's  growing  art,  there  can  be  no  doubt.  (2) 
As  to  Weak  Endings  :  The  Alidsunwter  Night's  Dream 
shows  us  but  one  (and  therefore  is  all  strong  ending, 
all  Regular  System  in  this  particular),  while  The  Tem- 
pest, in  a  smaller  number  of  lines,  has  67.  The  Weak 
ending  —  it  may  be  here  remarked  —  is  really  but  one 
kind  of  run-on  lines  ;  for  every  such  ending  as 

"  This  is  a  most  majestic  vision  ami 
Harmonious  charmingly," 
or  as 

"  It  sounds  no  more  ;  —  and  sure,  it  waits  upon 
Some  god  o'  th'  island," 

which  occur  so  frequently  in  The  Tempest,  really  runs 
the  voice  on  to  the  next  line,  and  perhaps  there  would 
be  little  need  for  distinguishing  this  particular  species 
of  run-on  lines  were  it  not  for  a  peculiarity  in  Shak- 
spere's use  of  it,  which  notably  separates  it  from  the 
others.  The  peculiarity  is  the  suddenness  and  lateness 
of  its  appearance  in  any  numbers.  There  is  here  no 
gradual  increase  :  Shakspere  at  first  seems  practically 
to  have  considered  weak  endings  inadmissible ;  in  the 
Two  Gentlemen  of  Verona  there  is  not  a  single  weak 
ending,  in  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  there  is  but 
one,  in  As  You  Like  It  but  two,  and  so  on ;  and  it 
is  not  until  we  get  to  Macbeth  (1606?)  that  we  sud- 
denly find  twenty-three  weak  endings.  Having  thus 
fairly  started  to  use  them,  Shakspere  evidently  began 
straightway  to  rejoice  in  the  long  phrasing  and   sweep 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  183 

which  they  render  possible  in  blank  verse ;  and  so  in 
Antony  and  Cleopatra  (1607,  1608?)  we  find  ninety- 
nine  weak  endings,  and  in  The  Tempest,  which  has 
but  a  little  over  half  the  total  of  lines  of  Antony  and 
Cleopatra,  we  reach  sixty-seven  —  proportionately  equal 
to  nearly  a  hundred  and  thirty. 

(3)  As  to  Double  Endings  :  the  nature  of  the  variety 
with  which  they  relieve  the  monotony  of  the  single 
ending  may  be  seen  at  a  glance  on  comparing  the  last 
bar  of  a  typic  single-ending  blank  verse  line,  musically 
noted,  as 

£v  A  A  A  A  A 

if  f  ic  r  It  r  ic  r  ic  r  1 

In     maid  -  en     med   -  i    -     ta  -   tion,    fan  -  cy      free, 

# 
—  where   i     is  the  single  ending,  —  with  the  last  bar  of 
free 

an  abnormal  double-ending  line,  similarly  noted,  as, 

(,  A  A  A  A 

i  J  r  If  r  If  r  If  r  lULd*  1 

The    stom-ach      of       my  sense.  Would  I        had  nev-er, 
where   ^^    —  which  any  one  acquainted  with  musical 

never 

notation  will  immediately  perceive  to  occupy  exactly  the 

same  time  as     '       in   the   line   above  —  is   the    double 
free  p 

ending,  or  feminine  ending.     Now  the   form    I       is  the 

free 

normal  form    and   is   what    the   ear    looks   for,    as  part 

of  the  Regular  System  ;    while    the    form  LhS     is  ab- 

nev-er 

normal,  and,  being  a  surprise  to  the  ear,  belongs  there- 
fore to  the  Irregular  System.    We  naturally  expect,  then, 

to  find  many  more  such  forms  as   LmS      at  the  ends  of 

nev-cr 


184  Music  and  Poetry 

lines  in  The  Tempest  than  in  the  Midsummer  Nighfs 
Dream.  And  we  are  not  disappointed.  The  advance 
here  toward  freedom  is  so  great  that,  while  in  the 
Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  there  are  but  twenty-nine 
double  endings,  there  are  in  The  Tempest  (with  a  smaller 
total  of  lines)  four  hundred  and  seventy-six  double 
endings. 

For  the  sake  of  presenting  the  sharp  contrast  of  Shak- 
spere's  extreme  periods,  no  mention  has  b.een  made,  in 
this  rapid  sketch  of  the  metrical  tests,  of  the  Middle  or 
Real  Period  which  we  found  represented  by  Hamlet. 
But  by  all  the  given  tests,  the  position  of  the  play  is 
confirmed.  In  a  total  of  3,924  lines,  Hamlet  presents 
141  rhymed  lines  (including  the  songs),  8  weak  endings, 
and  508  double  endings.  In  comparing  the  latter  num- 
ber—  the  508  double  endings  —  of  course  the  total 
number  of  lines  in  each  play  is  to  be  considered. 
Ha?nlet  has  3,924,  The  Tempest  but  2,058,  or  slightly 
over  half  as  many ;  yet  the  latter  play,  in  its  half  as 
many  lines,  has  nearly  as  many  double  endings  (476) 
as  Hamlet ;  that  is  to  say,  the  proportion  of  double  end- 
ings in   The  Tempest  is  nearly  twice  that  in  Hamlet. 

Thus,  tried  by  all  the  metrical  tests  proposed, 
the  relations  asserted  between  Midsui?imer  Nighfs 
Dream,  Hamlet,  and  The  Teinpest,  are  remarkably  con- 
firmed. The  four  tests  here  applied,  namely,  the  End- 
Stop,  the  Rhyme,  the  Strong  Ending,  and  the  Single 
Ending  (as  respectively  giving  into  the  Run-on,  the 
Rhymeless  or  Blank,  the  Weak  or  Light  Ending,  and 
the  Double  Ending  in  the  later  plays),  are  not  all  that 
might  have  been  used.  Without  even  mentioning  sev- 
eral others,  it  may  be  useful  —  as  possibly  inducing  some 
young  worker  to  make  what  seems   (at  least  to  me)  a 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  185 

desirable  contribution  to  Shaksperean  scholarship  —  to 
specify  a  test  which  has  not  yet  been  pursued.  This  I 
may  perhaps  properly  call  the  "  Rhythmic  Accent  Test." 
In  another  place  (The  Scietice  of  English  Verse,  p.  213) 
I  have  remarked  : 

"  Perhaps  everj'one  has  obser\'ed  that,  particularly  in 
Shakspere's  later  plays,  he  seems  absolutely  careless  as 
to  what  kind  of  word  the  rhythmic  accent  may  fall  on. 
Sometimes  it  is  on  the  article  the,  sometimes  the  prepo- 
sition of,  sometimes  the  conjunction  atid,  sometimes  the 
unaccented  syllable  of  a  two- sound  word,  as  quickens, 
instead  of  quickens,  and  so  on." 

The  remarkable  effect  of  this  freedom,  in  giving  endless 
play  to  the  seemingly  stiff  type  of  blank  verse,  is  mi- 
nutely detailed  in  the  author's  work  cited,  and  cannot 
be  entered  into  here ;  but  the  comparative  frequency 
with  which  these  accentual  variations  occur,  as  between 
early  and  late  plays,  has  never  been  reduced  to  numbers. 
Several  reasons  may  be  urged  for  the  belief  that  this 
might  prove  one  of  the  most  valuable  of  all  metrical 
tests.  In  fact,  when  we  consider  that  this  matter  of  the 
rhythmic  accent  is  one  which  affects  every  bar  (that  is, 
every  couplet  of  verse-sounds ;  for  every  normal  line  of 
blank  verse  not  only  presents  ten  verse-sounds,  but  pre- 
sents these  arranged  into  five  bars,  or  couplets,  by  the 
five  rhythmic  accents  which  are  always  present  or  ac- 
counted for ;  see  Science  of  English  Verse,  p.  215)  of 
each  line,  while  the  four  tests  just  now  applied  affect 
only  the  last  bar  of  each  line  ;  and  when  we  consider 
further  that  the  real  result  of  this  freedom  in  using  the 
rhythmic  accent  is  to  vary  the  monotonous  regularity 
of  the  Regular  System  with  the  charm  of  those  subtle 
rhythms  which  we  employ  in  familiar  discourse,  so  that 


1 86  Music  and  Poetry 

the  habit  of  such  freedom  might  grow  with  the  greatest 
uniformity  upon  a  poet,  and  might  thus  present  us  with 
a  test  of  such  uniform  development  as  to  be  rehable  for 
nicer  discriminations  than  any  of  the  more  irregular 
tests  can  be  pushed  to :  it  would  seem  fair  to  expect 
confirmations  of  great  importance  from  a  properly 
constructed  Table  of  Abnormal  Rhythmic  Accents  in 
Shakspere. 

We  have  now  pushed  over  three  main  lines  of  inquiry 
—  each,  let  it  be  remembered,  involving  several  subordi- 
nate lines  —  to  what  may  surely  be  called  a  reasonable 
certainty.  We  have  applied  a  Moral  Test,  an  Actual- 
Date  Test,  and  several  Metrical  Tests,  to  each  of  the 
three  plays,  A  Midsu?nmcr  Nighfs  Dream,  Hamlet,  and 
The  Tempest ;  and  every  indication  afforded  by  either 
has  gone  to  confirm  their  character  as  Representa- 
tive Plays  of  the  three  great  Periods  in  Shakspere's  life. 
This  is  a  case,  too,  when  indications  confirm  at  a  rate 
which  increases  very  rapidly ;  for  each  additional  proof 
brings  not  its  own  weight  alone,  but  its  weight  multipHed 
into  that  of  all  the  other  proofs. 

And  we  may  now  profitably  close  this  part  of  our  in- 
vestigation by  ascending  to  a  point  of  view  from  which 
what  were  apparently  three  lines  of  inquiry —  the  moral, 
the  historical,  the  metrical  —  really  resolve  themselves 
into  one,  and  place  the  whole  matter  before  us  in  a  holy 
and  reasonable  light. 

For  —  as  has  been  hinted  already  at  more  than  one 
point,  by  way  of  anticipation  —  a  great  artist,  in  grow- 
ing, grows  as  a  whole,  and  not  by  parts  nor  into  mon- 
strosities;  as  he  grows  (i)  in  his  years  (historically),  he 
grows  (2)  in  his  grasp  of  the  facts  of  Life  (niorally),  and 
(3)   in  his  grasp  of  the  facts  of  Art    (in  Shakspere's 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  187 

case,  "metrically,"^  though  this  is  a  poor  term).  One 
of  these  advances  may  be  said  to  imply  the  other,  with  a 
great  artist ;  it  is,  indeed,  by  virtue  of  this  wholeness  in 
growth  that  the  great  artist  is  great.  We  may  do  a  ser- 
vice to  great  art  by  the  sweeping  doctrine  that  in  what- 
ever case  the  artist — whether  poet,  painter,  sculptor, 
musician  —  has  not  become  a  better  artist  and  a  better 
man  and  a  more  aged  being,  all  together,  the  failure  to 
do  so  is  a  note  of  weakness  which  simply  takes  away 
from  all  his  greatness. 

For,  closely  examined,  there  is  a  point  where  what  is 
called  the  "  mere  technic "  of  the  artist  merges  into 
and  becomes  wholly  indistinguishable  from  his  morality. 
Not  only,  at  this  point,  has  the  knowledge  of  Pure  Beauty 
become  so  completely  a  sense,  like  the  sense  of  sight  or 
smell,  that  he  cannot  do  an  ugly  act  (whether  the  ugli- 
ness be  moral  or  artistic,  whether  the  act  be  a  theft,  an 
envy,  a  jealousy,  a  hatred,  or  any  of  those  smaller  sins 
for  which  men  generally  consider  themselves  completely 
excused  by  the  plea  of  weakness  —  or  a  bit  of  bad  draw- 
ing, a  weakish  chord,  a  meretricious  rhythm  or  rhyme,  a 
mawkish  curve)  simply  because  it  is  ugly,  —  that  is,  be- 
cause the  sense  of  beauty  recoils  from  it  just  as  the 
sense  of  smell  recoils  from  an  offensive  odor  or  that  of 
hearing  from  a  harsh  noise  ;  not  only,  I  say,  has  Beauty 
thus  become  a  sense,  guiding  the  artist  away  from  the 
morally  bad  as  well  as  the  artistically  bad,  and  perform- 
ing precisely  the  functions  of  our  physical  sense ;  but 

1  It  ought  to  be  added  here  that  of  course  a  wholly  different 
line  of  art-tests  is  also  applicable  to  Shakspere.  He  was  not 
only  verse-wright,  but  play-wright ;  and  his  art  in  constructing  a 
play,  in  balancing  figures,  etc.,  if  similarly  examined,  is  found  to 
advance  in  precisely  the  same  direction  with  the  verse-art,  that  is, 
towards  Freedom,  towards  the  Irregular  System. 


1 88  Music  and  Poetry 

the  power  of  grasping  the  contradictory  details  of  our 
physical  and  spiritual  life  and  of  arranging  these  con- 
tradictions into  a  tolerable  proportion,  —  contradictions 
which  would  drive  the  lesser  world  of  ordinary  men  and 
women  to  instant  suicide  if  these  were  not  protected 
by  partial  blindness  and  by  looking  the  other  way, — 
this  power  is  at  bottom  the  same  with  that  which  seizes 
upon  the  similar  details  of  verse-structure,  which  clearly 
recognizes  the  contradiction  of  what  is  herein  called  the 
Regular  System  as  opposed  to  the  Irregular  System,  and 
which  instead  of  absurdly  fighting  the  fact  of  their  oppo- 
sition finds  it  to  be  the  very  basis  of  music,  and  employs 
it  to  the  purposes  of  formal  poetry.  To  make  a  moral 
music  out  of  the  antagonistic  facts  of  life ;  to  make  a 
verse-music  out  of  the  antagonistic  facts  of  letter-sounds  : 
this  is  so  far  one  problem  as  that,  when  we  have  passed 
those  limits  to  which  mere  cleverness  can  reach  in  any- 
thing, and  beyond  which  lies  the  domain  of  genius  and 
of  art,  it  may  fairly  be  said  that  a  man  with  an  original 
gift  of  poetic  expression  would  surely  grow  in  his  faculties 
for  both  as  if  both  implied  one  faculty. 

It  seems  at  any  rate  clear  —  without  risking  any  part 
of  the  present  case  on  a  theory  which  may  seem  to 
many  fine-spun  —  that,  with  Shakspere,  the  larger  the 
music  of  his  verse,  the  larger  became  the  music  of  his 
life,  and  vice  versa. 

And,  finally,  these  plays,  possessing  these  peculiar 
relations  to  Shakspere's  entire  growth,  are  carried  to  a 
plane  of  unique  interest  by  the  relations  they  reveal  to 
each  other.  The  details  of  these  relations  will  be  given 
in  the  notes  to  the  passages  embodying  them,  as  they 
occur.  But  it  may  be  worth  while  to  point  out,  here, 
at  least  three  of  these  in  a  cartoon  outline.     Observe, 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  189 

then,  that  in  all  our  three  plays  we  have  certam  views 
of  man  in  his  relations  (i)  to  Nature,  (2)  to  his  Fellow- 
man,  and  (3)  to  Art. 

(i)  In  A  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  Nature  is  a 
capricious  Puck,  which  is  man's  superior  and  plays  with 
him ;  in  Hajnkf,  it  is  a  firm-purposed  ghost,  which  is  still 
man's  superior,  but  instead  of  playing  with  him  drives 
him  on  to  terrible  ends ;  in  The  Tempest  it  is  a  servant, 
Ariel,  and  man  has  become  lord  of  it,  for  benevolent  ends. 

(2)  In  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dreajn  man's  Fellow 
man  is  the  object  of  Capricious  Love  or  Gentle  Satire ; 
in  Hamlet  he  is  the  object  of  Revenge ;  in  The  Tempest 
he  is  the  object  of  Forgiveness. 

(3)  All  have  a  play-within-the-play,  or  anti-masque; 
that  is,  a  work  of  art  as  one  of  the  factors  of  the  plot. 
In  the  Midsujnmer  Nighfs  Dream  this  anti-masque  is 
Bottom's  Burlesque ;  in  Hamlet  it  is  Hamlet's  Trap  to 
catch  the  king's  conscience ;  in  The  Tempest  it  is  Pros- 
pero's  art,  employed  for  the  delight  of  two  young  lovers. 

These  inter-relations  exist,  of  course  by  no  intent, 
but  solely  through  the  wholeness  of  Shakspere's  life. 
Given  a  play  to  write,  he  wrote  it  from  the  deepest  of 
his  then  state  of  mind.  Thus  every  play  not  only  beats 
like  the  bosom  of  a  human  being,  but  beats  with  the 
rate  of  rhythm  belonging  to  the  stage  of  growth  at  which 
it  was  written. 

Ill 

The  Three  Corresponding  Works  of  Chaucer 

If  we  now  compare  these  three  representative  plays 
of  Shakspere  with  three  works  of  Chaucer  which  are  re- 
spectively motived  upon  substantially  the  same  themes. 


190  Music  and  Poetry 

and  thus  project  Shakspere  upon  a  background  of 
Chaucer,  or  Chaucer  upon  a  background  of  Shakspere, 
the  tracts  and  curves  of  difference  between  the  two  men 
become  very  plain.  These  will  be  traced  in  detail  by 
the  notes  hereinafter  appended  to  the  special  passages 
of  these  works  which  bring  out  their  relations;  but 
meantime  advantage  •vill  be  found  in  beginning  with  a 
view  in  which  the  plots  of  these  works  are  reduced  to  a 
number  of  lines  so  small  as  to  be  apprehensible  at  one 
glance.  It  is  proposed  to  study  the  first  of  our  plays  — 
A  Midsummer  Nighfs  Drea?n  —  in  conjunction  with 
Chaucer's  Knighfs  Tale;  the  second  —  Hamlet — in 
conjunction  with  Chaucer's  Pardoner's  Tale ;  and  the 
third — The  Tempest — in  conjunction  with  Chaucer's 
Clerk's  Tale. 

The  widest  possible  generalization  of  these  six  works 
would  perhaps  be,  using  familiar  terms  : 

( 1 )  The  plots  of  the  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  and 
its  corresponding  Knighfs  I'ale  are  both  embodiments 
of  a  conception  which  may  be  stated  as,  The  Course  of 
True  Love  never  did  run  Smooth  ; 

(2)  The  plots  of  Hajnlet  and  The  Pardoner's  Tale  are 
both  embodiments  of  a  conception  which  may  be  stated 
as.  The  Course  of  True  Hate  never  did  run  Smooth  ; 

(3)  The  plots  of  The  Tempest  and  The  Clerk's  Tale  are 
both  embodiments  of  a  conception  in  which  the  meaning 
of  the  term  "  love  "  has  undergone  a  prodigious  rectifi- 
cation and  enlargement  since  the  Dream  Period,  and 
which  may  be  stated  as,  In  the  Course  of  True  Love  all 
Things  ru7t  Smooth. 

A  slightly  sketched  anatomy  of  the  special  forms  as- 
sumed in  each  of  these  works  by  these  general  conceptions 
will  now  be  helpful. 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  191 

The  Knighfs  Tale  and  The  Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream. 

(i)  In  the  case  of  the  Knighfs  Tale  and  the  Mid- 
summer Nighfs  Dreajn  we  have  a  connexion  which  is 
not  only  logical,  that  is,  due  to  a  common  underlying 
basis  of  idea,  but  which  is  also  historic,  that  is,  due  to 
an  actual  use  by  Shakspere  of  characters,  thoughts,  and 
situations  which  he  found  in  Chaucer's  Knighfs  Tale. 
I  think  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  extent  of  this 
connection  has  not  hitherto  been  appreciated.  It  is 
traced  in  the  notes  accompanying  the  works  hereinafter 
given  ;  but,  meantime,  I  may  here  remark  that  the  reason 
for  this  failure  to  apprehend  the  true  relations  of  these 
works  unquestionably  lies  in  the  circumstance  that  the 
Midsummer  Nighfs  Dream  is  an  eddy  of  ideas  which,  as 
they  whirl,  seem  confused  enough ;  but  this  eddy  is  pro- 
duced by  the  meeting  of  two  currents  of  thought  which, 
once  seen,  can  be  traced  along  quite  unmistakable 
courses.  One,  as  presently  shown,  proceeds  from 
Chaucer's  Knighfs  Tale,  which  —  as  I  think  can  be 
clearly  shown  —  Shakspere  must  have  read  very  shortly 
before  he  wrote  his  Dream.  This  current  includes 
Theseus,  Hippolyta,  Egeus,  Philostrate.  (characters 
all  taken  bodily  from  the  Knighfs  Tale),  and  the 
fairies,  —  in  fact,  all  except  the  action  which  proceeds 
from  Bottom  and  his  fellow-clowns,  culminating  in  the 
play-within-the-play,  or  anti-masque,  of  Pyramus  and 
Thisbe.  Thai  current  comes  —  I  think  —  from  the 
Greene-Harvey-Nash  quarrel,  and  can  be  distinctly 
traced,  —  along  a  number  of  catch-words  and  clew-ideas 
which  becomes  so  large  as  to  make  belief  the  direction 
of  much  the  least  resistance,  —  to  Greene's  Menaphon, 
Harvey's  Four  Letters,  Nash's  Pierce's  Supererogation, 


1^2  Music  and  Poetry 

and  Greene's  Groatsworth  of  Wit,  a  body  of  literature 
which  must  have  possessed  extraordinary  interest  for 
young  Shakspere  just  at  the  time  he  must  have  been 
about  to  write  his  Midsummer  Night's  Dreatn,  and  with 
which  he  was  unquestionably  saturated.  This  whole 
matter  of  Bottom  and  that  ilk,  and  of  Pyramus  and 
Thisbe,  seems  in  fact  to  be  a  gentle  satire  upon 
Greene  and  his  crew  in  payment  of  Greene's  fling 
of  2'he  tiger's  heart  wrapped  in  a  player's  hide  at 
Shakspere.  But  this  cannot  be  further  treated  at  pres- 
ent,—  and  remembering  this  peculiar  historic  connexion 
between  the  Midsummer  Night's  Dream  and  Chaucer's 
Knighfs  Tale  which  is  superadded  to  the  merely  logical 
connection  binding  Hamlet  with  the  Pardoner's  Tale  or 
The  Tempest  with  The  Clerk! s  Tale,  let  us  outline  the 
largest  processes  of  this  couplet. 

In  the  Knighfs  Tale :  (a)  in  contact  with  Theseus 
and  Hippolyta  come  (d)  two  young  men  (Palamon  and 
Arcite),  who  (c)  love  one  young  woman  (Emilia)  ; 
(d)  they  quarrel  and  (e)  fight  about  her  (/)  in  a  wood 
(g)  to  which  all  the  characters  are  brought ;  (h)  by 
Theseus'  gracious  arrangement  (/)  a  pageant  or  tourney 
is  made  wherein  Palamon  and  Arcite,  each  with  a  hun- 
dred companions,  wage  battle  for  the  lady;  (k)  mean- 
time the  supernatural  Powers  become  involved,  —  Mars, 
Venus,  Diana,  and  Saturn;  by  whose  machinations 
(/)  Arcite  conquers,  but  (m)  in  prancing  to  his  bride  is 
killed  by  his  horse,  through  a  god's  jealous  working,  and 
(«)  finally,  after  years  of  tribulation,  Palamon,  though 
beaten,  takes  all,  and  wins  Emilia  to  wife.  Caprice  and 
criss-cross  :  this  runs  through  all  the  Knight's  Tale  of 
Chaucer. 

In  A  Midsummer  Night's  Dream,  this  same  caprice 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  193 

and  criss-cross  are  simply  carried  to  the  fantastic  point ; 
and  note  that  along  all  the  points  (which  are  lettered  for 
this  purpose)  from  (a)  to  (/()  the  circumstances  are 
identical,  letter  for  letter,  with  those  just  given  in  the 
summary  of  the  Xfu'g/ifs  Tale.  {a)  In  contact  with 
Theseus  and  Hippolyta,  come  (<5)  two  young  men  (De- 
metrius and  Lysander),  who  (r)  love  the  one  young 
woman  (Hermia)  ;  (r/)  they  quarrel,  and  (<?)  at  another 
stage  of  the  play  attempt  to  fight,  not  about  this,  but 
another,  her  (/)  in  a  wood  {§)  to  which  all  the  char- 
acters are  brought  ;  {li)  by  Theseus'  gracious  permission 
(/')  a  play  setting  forth  how  that  the  course  of  Pyramus' 
and  Thisbe's  true  love  ran  not  smooth,  is  brought  before 
him  by  a  company  of  Athenian  clowns ;  {k)  meantime, 
the  supernatural  Powers,  or  Powers  of  Nature  (Oberon, 
Titania,  Puck,  instead  of  Mars  and  Venus  and  Diana  and 
Saturn)  have  been  at  work,  whereby  Demetrius  and 
Lysander  have  been  wrought  to  forget  Hermia  and  as 
madly  love  Helena,  while  Queen  Titania  by  the  same 
practice  dotes  upon  a  monster,  being  a  man  with 
an  ass's  head ;  (/)  but  the  same  Caprice  which  did 
these  things  undoes  them,  and  (w)  every  Jack  is  re- 
stored to  his  proper  Jill,  until  («)  we  have  Theseus  and 
Hippolyta,  Lysander  and  Hermia,  Demetrius  and  Helena, 
in  bliss,  Bottom  and  his  fellows  snoring  with  visions  of 
sixpence  a  day,  while  the  reconciled  Oberon  and  Titania 
with  their  elf  train  hover  about  the  three  bridal  couches 
and  distribute  blessing  until  daybreak. 

The  Pardoner'' s  Tale  and  Hamlet. 

(2)  Between  the  following  plots  no  historic  connex- 
ion exists,  and  there  is  therefore  no  occasion  to  specify 
the  steps  minutely,  as  in  the  last  instance. 

»3 


194  Music  and  Poetry 

In  The  Pardoner's  Tale :  three  riotous  fellows  of 
Flanders,  seated  at  drink  in  a  tavern,  hear  the  clink  of 
a  bell  go  by,  and  know  that  a  corpse  is  passing ;  inflamed 
with  anger  against  Death,  of  whom  they  hear  also  great 
complaint,  they  resolve  to  slay  him ;  rushing  forth,  they 
compel  an  old  man  to  tell  them  Death's  whereabouts, 
who  informs  them  that  Death  has  but  now  been  lying 
under  a  certain  oak  in  yonder  grove  ;  hastening  to  that 
tree,  they  find  under  it  seven  bushels  of  new  gold  florins ; 
fearing  accusation  of  theft,  they  resolve  to  wait  by  the 
treasure  until  night,  in  order  to  haul  it  home  unseen; 
and,  being  hungry  and  thirsty,  send  their  youngest  com- 
rade to  town  for  meat  and  wine ;  he,  buying  the  same  in 
town,  buys  also  certain  poison  and  drops  it  in  the  bottle, 
that  his  comrades  may  be  slain  and  he  take  the  whole 
treasure ;  in  his  absence,  however,  the  two  comrades 
plot  to  slay  him  on  his  return,  and  they  to  take  that 
treasure  :  all  of  which  plots  are  indeed  carried  out,  but 
in  contrary  order ;  for,  on  his  arrival  with  the  victual  the 
two  instantly  slay  him  ;  and,  being  worn  with  that  work, 
drink  hard  of  the  poisoned  bottle  ;  whereby  presently  all 
three  lie  dead  under  the  oak,  and  the  old  man  is  justified 
of  his  saying  that  they  would  find  Death  at  that  place. 

In  Hamlet :  Claudius  in  secret  murders  his  brother, 
the  King  of  Denmark,  then  seats  him  upon  his 
brother's  throne  and  marries  his  brother's  wife ;  whereof 
young  Hamlet,  son  to  the  murdered  king,  is  informed 
by  his  father's  ghost,  and,  setting  about  to  perform 
the  ghost's  command  of  revenge,  feigns  to  become, 
or  becomes,  insane  ;  to  make  sure  of  the  ghost's  truth, 
he  causes  a  play  to  be  played  before  the  king,  wherein 
the  scene  of  the  secret  murder  is  cunningly  re- 
enacted;  the  king's  terror  confirms  the  ghost's  word; 


Chaucer  and  Shakspere  195 

Hamlet  murders  Polonius  by  mistake  for  the  king; 
Ophelia,  Polonius'  daughter  and  Hamlet's  dear  Love,  is 
crazed  and  drowned ;  Laertes,  Polonius'  son,  seeks 
revenge ;  meantime,  the  king  ships  Hamlet  to  England, 
with  command  to  that  king  to  slay  him ;  but  Hamlet  in 
secret  changes  the  commission,  and  sends  on  his  keepers, 
Rosencrantz  and  Guildenstern,  bearing  their  own  death- 
warrant,  while  Hamlet  returns ;  by  plot  betwixt  the  king 
and  Laertes,  Hamlet  fences  with  Laertes,  this  latter  hav- 
ing arranged  a  buttonless  and  poisoned  foil  beforehand ; 
therewith  he  wounds  Hamlet,  but  Hamlet  in  the  struggle 
exchanges  foils,  and  with  the  same  poisoned  weapon 
wounds  Laertes ;  meantime  the  Queen,  carousing  to 
Hamlet's  play,  drinks  unawares  from  a  flagon  the  King 
had  poisoned  for  Hamlet  to  drink  from ;  which  being 
discovered,  Hamlet  stabs  the  King  with  the  poisoned 
foil ;  and  presently  Laertes,  the  King,  the  Queen,  and 
Hamlet  lie  dead  together. 

The  Clerk's  Tale  and  The  Tempest. 

(3)  In  Chaucer's  The  Clerk'' s  Tale :  the  young 
Marquis  Walter,  being  entreated  by  his  loving  people 
to  marry,  chooses  out  of  all  his  land  the  beggar-maid 
Griselda,  who  tends  her  aged  father  alone  in  a  hovel ; 
she  reigns  with  her  husband  thence  in  marvellous  grace 
and  faithfulness,  winning  all  the  world  to  her  for  wisdom 
and  gentleness ;  but  a  madness  of  assaying  her  love  to 
the  utmost  seizes  her  husband,  and  he  pours  upon  her 
injuries  frightful  to  name,  sending  for  her  one  little  child 
by  a  grim  soldier,  and  carrying  it  forth  to  pretended 
death  under  accusation  that  the  people  will  not  have  an 
heir  of  a  low-born  mother ;  which  she  forgives,  even  in 


196  Music  and   Poetry- 

lingering  over  the  child,  saying  that  her  lord  must  be 
wise ;  and  after  yet  more  dreadful  wounds,  all  forgiven 
heartily,  the  Marquis,  still  unsatisfied,  puts  her  away  from 
him,  and  commands  her  back  to  her  old  father,  Janicola, 
who  receives  her  in  sorrow ;  but  presently  the  Marquis 
bids  that  she  return  and  get  ready  his  house  for  his  new 
bride ;  which  she  does,  —  sweeps  and  bakes  with  her 
own  hands,  and  receives  and  tends  the  supposed  new 
bride  in  all  gentleness ;  whereupon  the  conquered  Mar- 
quis reveals  all,  places  in  her  arms  the  pretended  bride, 
who  is  her  own  daughter,  taken  from  her  many  years 
before,  and  restores  her  sons  also ;  and  a  great  feast 
crowns  the  now-perfect  worship  of  Marquis  Walter  and 
the  always-perfect  forgiveness  of  his  Griselda. 

In  The  Tempest  Antonio,  having  artfully  usurped  the 
dukedom  of  his  full-trusting  brother  Prosper©,  causes  the 
latter,  with  his  infant  daughter  Miranda,  to  be  set  upon 
the  ocean  in  an  open  boat  for  the  winds  to  dispose  of; 
Prospero  reaches  a  desert  island,  and  by  long  study  be- 
comes lord  of  life  and  nature  ;  years  afterward  his  brother 
Antonio,  together  with  Alonso,  King  of  Naples,  and  Fer- 
dinand, son  thereof,  with  many  others,  sails  by  that 
region  from  Tunis ;  Prospero,  with  help  of  his  fairy  ser- 
vant, Ariel,  calls  up  a  tempest,  wrecks  the  ship,  brings 
all  parties  ashore  in  groups  arranged  for  his  purposes, 
guides  Ferdinand  to  Miranda,  who  straightway  love  each 
other,  involves  the  others  in  adventure  and  deadly  con- 
spiracy about  the  island,  and  finally  brings  all  to  his 
cave,  where  he  forgives  his  unnatural  brother,  reassumes 
his  dukedom,  brings  several  criminals  to  repentance  and 
better  life,  and  arranges  to  set  sail,  over  smooth  seas,  with 
a  new-hearted  following,  to  Italy. 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  197 


XII 

Paul  H.   Hayne's  Poetry 

At  a  time  when  the  war  of  secession  had  left  the 
South  in  a  condition  which  appeared  to  render  an  ex- 
clusively literary  life  a  hopeless  impossibility,  Mr.  Hayne 
immured  himself  in  the  woods  of  Georgia,  and  gave 
himself  wholly  to  his  pen.  Perhaps  this  was  the  most 
convincing  method  he  could  have  adopted  of  testifying 
by  acts  to  his  poetic  nascitur,  for  it  was  striking  an  au- 
dacious challenge-blow  on  the  very  shield  of  Fate,  and 
probably  none  but  a  poet  would  have  dared  it.  Doubt- 
less, the  struggle  which  succeeded  was  passionate,  fierce, 
often  bitter,  sometimes  despairing ;  one  finds  traces  of 
all  this  along  the  music  of  these  verses.  It  is  pleasant 
now  to  open  Legends  and  Lyrics  with  the  knowledge 
that  the  darkest  of  his  conflict  is  over,  and  that  in  the 
growing  light  of  appreciation  his  by-past  shadow  will 
show  only  like  a  dark  calyx  through  which  the  poet's 
rose  of  fame  is  bursting. 

We  wish  to  ease  our  mind  in  the  beginning  of  the  only 
material  quarrel  we  have  to  pick  with  Mr.  Hayne  ;  and, 
for  the  double  purpose  of  setting  forth  our  casus  belli, 
and  of  showing  the  reader  what  manner  of  work  Mr. 
Hayne  can  do  in  the  most  difficult  of  poetic  forms,  we 
quote  the  sonnet  addressed 


198  Music  and  Poetry 

TO   WILLIAM  MORRIS. 

In  some  fair  realm  unbound  of  time  or  space, 

Where  souls  of  all  dead  May-times,  with  their  play 

Of  blissful  winds,  soft  showers  and  bird-notes  gay, 

Make  mystic  music  in  the  flower-bright  place, 

Yea,  there,  O  poets !  radiant  face  to  face, 

Keen  heart  to  heart,  beneath  the  enchanted  day 

Ye  met,  each  hearkening  to  the  other's  lay 

With  rapt,  sweet  eyes,  and  thoughts  of  Old-World  grace. 

"  Son,"  saith  the  elder  bard,  "  when  thou  wert  born, 

So  yearned  toward  thine  my  spirit's  fervency. 

Flamelike  its  warmth  on  thy  deep  soul  was  shed ; 

Hence  the  ripe  blood  of  England's  lustier  morn 

Of  song  burns  through  thee ;  hence  alone  on  thee 

Fall  the  rich  bays  which  bloomed  round  Chaucer's  head!" 

This  sonnet  was  written  on  reading  the  '*  L'Envoy"  in 
the  third  volume  of  Morris's  Earthly  Paradise.  Now  — 
though  Mr.  Hayne  is  by  no  means  the  only  person  who 
has  likened  William  Morris  to  Geoffrey  Chaucer  —  the 
enthusiastic  belief  that  the  spirit  of  the  older  poet  has 
come  to  shine  again  in  the  later  one,  has  never  been 
more  tenderly  and  reverently  embodied  than  in  this 
lovely  sonnet ;  but,  protesting  that  we  owe  some  keen 
delights  to  Mr.  Morris,  we  totally  dissent  from  the  opin- 
ion that  there  is  at  bottom  any  such  resemblance  betwixt 
him  and  Chaucer  as  to  entitle  him  to  any  sonship  or 
heirship  of  the  latter.  Moreover,  we  believe  that  this 
theory  involves  far  more  than  a  mere  critical  estimate  of 
the  likeness  or  unlikeness  of  two  poets;  nay,  we  are 
sure  that  Mr.  Hayne  and  all  modern  poets  would  do 
well  to  drink  much  of  Chaucer  and  little  of  Morris.  For 
—  to  indicate  briefly  some  points  of  contrast  —  how  does 
the  spire  of  hope  spring  and  upbound  into  the  infinite  in 
Chaucer;  while,  on  the  other  hand,  how  blank,  world- 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  199 

bound,  and  wearying  is  the  %\.onQ  facade  of  hopelessness 
which  rears  itself  uncompromisingly  behind  the  gayest 
pictures  of  William  Morris  !  Chaucer  is  eager,  expect- 
ant. To-day  is  so  beautiful,  perhaps  to-morrow  will  be 
more  beautiful :  life  is  young,  who  knows  ?  —  he  seems 
to  cry,  with  splendid  immeasurable  confidence  in  the  re- 
served powers  of  nature  and  of  man.  But  Morris  does 
not  hope  :  there  is,  there  will  be,  nothing  new  under  the 
sun.  To-morrow?  that  may  not  come  ;  if  it  does,  it  will 
be  merely  to-day  revamped  ;  therefore  let  us  amuse  our- 
selves with  the  daintiest  that  art  and  culture  can  give : 
this  is  his  essential  utterance. 

Again,  how  openly  joyful  is  Chaucer;  how  secretly 
melancholy  is  Morris  !  Both,  it  is  true,  are  full  of  sun- 
shine ;  but  Chaucer's  is  spring  sunshine,  Morris's  is 
autumn.  Chaucer's  falls  upon  bold  mountain  sides 
where  are  rocks,  lithe  grasses,  and  trees  with  big  lusty 
boughs  and  juicy  leaves ;  where  the  wild  motions  of  na- 
ture, from  spring-winds  to  leaping  fawns,  are  artlessly 
free  and  unspeakably  blissful ;  and  yet  where  all  other 
forms,  whether  of  monstrous,  terrible,  or  wicked,  are  truly 
revealed.  Morris's,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a  late,  pleas- 
ant, golden-tinted  light  (with  just  the  faintest  hint  of  a 
coming  chill  of  twilight  in  it),  faUing  upon  an  exquisitely 
wrought  marble  which  lies  half-buried  in  the  sand,  and 
which,  Greek  as  it  is,  dainty  as  it  is,  marvellous  as  it  is, 
is  nevertheless  a  fragment  of  a  ruin.  Chaucer  rejoices 
as  only  those  can  who  know  the  bound  of  good  red 
blood  through  unobstructed  veins,  and  the  thrilling 
tingle  of  nerve  and  sinew  at  amity ;  and  who  can  trans- 
port this  healthy  animalism  into  their  unburdened  minds, 
and  spiritualize  it  so  that  the  mere  drawing  of  breath  is 
at  once  a  keen  delight  and  an  inwardly-felt  practical  act 


200  Music  and  Poetry 

of  praise  to  the  God  of  a  strong  and  beautiful  world. 
Morris  too  has  his  sensuous  element,  but  it  is  utterly 
unlike  Chaucer's ;  it  is  dilettante,  it  is  amateur  sensual- 
ism ;  it  is  not  strong,  though  sometimes  excessive,  and 
it  is  nervously  afraid  of  that  satiety  which  is  at  once  its 
chief  temptation  and  its  most  awful  doom. 

Again,  Chaucer  lives,  Morris  dreams.  Chaucer,  for  all 
the  old-world  tales  he  tells,  yet  tells  them  with  the 
mouths  and  manners  of  his  living  time,  and  so  gives  us  a 
picture  of  it  like  life  itself.  Morris  stands  between  his 
people  and  his  readers,  interpreting  his  characters,  who 
all  advance  to  the  same  spot  on  the  stage,  communicate 
per  him  in  the  same  language,  the  same  dialect,  the  same 
tone,  then  glide  away  with  the  same  dreamy  mechanism.  -^ 
The  Canterbury  Tales  is  simply  a  drama  with  somewhat 
more  of  stage  direction  than  is  common;  but  the 
Earthly  Paradise  is  a  reverie,  which  would  hate  nothing 
so  much  as  to  be  broken  by  any  collision  with  that  rude 
actual  life  which  Chaucer  portrays. 

And  finally  —  for  the  Hmits  of  this  paper  forbid  more 
than  the  merest  indication  of  a  few  of  the  many  points 
of  contrast  between  these  two  —  note  the  faith  that 
shines  in  Chaucer  and  the  doubt  that  darkens  in  Morris. 
Has  there  been  any  man  since  St.  John  so  lovable  as 
"  the  Persoune  "  ?  or  any  sermon  since  that  on  the 
Mount  so  keenly  analytical,  so  pathetic,  so  deep,  so  piti- 
ful, so  charitable,  so  brotherly,  so  pure,  so  manly,  so 
faithful,  so  hopeful,  so  sprightly,  so  terrible,  so  childlike, 
so  winning,  so  utterly  loving,  as  The  Persoune'' s  Tale} 
But  where  (it  is  enough  to  ask  the  question  in  such  a 
connection)  in  all  that  William  Morris  has  written  may 
one  find,  not  indeed  anything  like  the  Persoune  and  his 
tale,  for  that  would  be  too  much  to  ask  —  there  is  no 


Paul   H.  Hayne's  Poetry  201 

man  since  Shakspere  who  has  been  at  all  capable  of 
that,  —  but  anything  even  indicating  the   conception  of 
the  possibility  of  such  a  being  as  the  Persoune  ?    To  this 
height,  to   this  depth,  neither  William  Morris  nor  any 
other  man  has  reached  since  Dan  Chaucer  wrote.     Let 
us  Shakspere-worshippers  not  forget  that  Chaucer  lived 
two  centuries  earlier  than  Shakspere,  and  had  to  deal 
with  a  crude  poetic  language  which  Shakspere  found  a 
magnificent  song- instrument,  all  in  tune  and  ready  to  his 
hand.     Let  us  not  forget  that  Shakspere  is  first  poet  and 
Chaucer  second  poet,  and  that  these  two  repose  alone, 
apart,  far,  far  above  any  spot  where  later  climbers  have 
sunk  to  rest.     And  this  adjuration  is  here  made  with  a 
particular   and   unequivocal  solemnity,   because  of  the 
conviction  that  we  expressed  in  the  outset  of  this  subject, 
that  the  estimate  of  these  two  poets  which  would  have 
them  like  enough  to  be  father  and  son,  involves  deeper 
matter  than   mere  criticism.      For   if  it   be   true    that 
William  Morris  is  Chaucer  in  modern  guise  ;  if  it  be  true 
that  by  virtue  of  this  nineteenth-century  dress,  Chaucer, 
the  glowing,  actual  man  and  lover  and  poet  and  priest 
and  man's  brother,  is  changed  into  Morris,  the  aimless 
sunset-dreamer  of   old  beautiful  dreams;   if  Chaucer's 
hope  is  in  five  hundred  years  darkened  to  Morris's  thin- 
veiled   despair,  Chaucer's  joy  to    Morris's   melancholy, 
Chaucer's  faith  to  Morris's  blank,  Chaucer's  religion  to 
Morris's  love-vagueness ;  if,  we  say,  it  be  possible  that 
five   centuries   have   wrought  Chaucer,  that  is  life,  into 
Morris,   that    is    a    dream-of-the-past :     then,   in    God's 
name,  with  all  reverence,  what  will  five  more  centuries 
do  to  us?     A  true   Hindu  life-weariness  (to  use  one  of 
Novalis'   marvellous  phrases)    is  really  the  atmosphere 
which  produces  the  exquisite  haze  of  Morris's  pictures. 


101  Music  and  Poetry 

Can  any  poet  —  and  we  respectfully  beg  Mr.  Hayne  to 
think  upon  this  view  of  the  matter,  being  emboldened  to 
do  so  by  our  regard  for  his  devotion  to  letters  and  for 
his  achievements  in  that  behalf—  can  any  poet,  we  say, 
shoot  his  soul's  arrow  to  its  best  height,  when  at  once 
bow  and  string  and  muscle  and  nerve  are  slackened  in 
this  vaporous  and  relaxing  air,  that  comes  up  out  of  the 
old  dreams  of  fates  that  were  false  and  of  passions  that 
were  not  pure  ? 

In  convincing  testimony  that  this  question  must  be 
answered  in  the  negative,  any  careful  reader  of  Legends 
and  Lyrics  will  observe  that  it  is  precisely  when  Mr. 
Hayne  escapes  out  of  this  influence  that  he  is  at  his  best. 
Compare  for  example  Mr.  Hayne's  treatment  of  the 
Wife  of  Brittany  with  the  unnamed  sonnet  on  page  55, 
which  we  shall  presently  quote.  The  Wife  of  Brittany 
is  a  legend  founded  upon  the  plot  of  the  Frankeleine's 
jaU  of  Chaucer.  Now  in  Chaucer's  time  this  was  a 
practical  poem;  many  men  had  not  really  settled  in 
their  minds  whether  it  was  right  to  break  even  a  crimi- 
nal oath,  made  in  folly.  But  the  plot  is  only  conceiva- 
ble as  a  thing  of  the  past,  it  belongs  to  the  curiosities  of 
history ;  and  although  Mr.  Hayne  has  told  the  story  with 
a  thousand  tender  imaginings,  with  many  charming 
graces  of  versification,  with  rare  strokes  of  pathos,  and 
with  a  final  flow  of  lucid  and  silvery  melody,  yet  the 
poem  as  a  whole  never  reaches  the  artistic  height  at- 
tained by  the  sonnet  to  the  mocking-bird.  In  the  Wife 
of  Brittany  and  in  all  similar  artistic  ventures  Mr.  Hayne 
will  write  under  the  disadvantage  of  feeling  at  the  bottom 
of  his  heart  that  the  passion  of  the  poem  is  amateur  pas- 
sion, the  terror  of  it  amateur  terror,  and  the  whole  busi- 
ness little  more  than  a  dainty  titillation  of  the  unreal.    But 


Paul   H.   Hayne's  Poetry  203 

in  the  sonnet  how  different !  Here  the  yellow-jessamine, 
the  bird,  the  vine-clumps,  the  odor,  the  bird-song,  all 
are  real ;  they  doubtless  exist  in  their  actual,  lovely 
entities  around  Mr.  Hayne's  home  in  the  forest,  and  they 
have  taken  hold  upon  him  so  fairly  that  he  has  turned 
them  into  a  poem  meriting  his  own  description  of  the 
mocking  bird's  song : 

"  A  star  of  music  in  a  fiery  cloud." 

Having  thus  spoken  in  the  genuine  hope  of  suggesting 
to  Mr.  Hayne's  mind  a  train  of  thought  which  might  be 
serviceable  to  his  genius,  we  proceed  to  remark  that  in 
Legends  and  Lyrics  we  find  no  polemical  discussion,  no 
"science,"  no  "progress,"  no  "  Comtism,"  no  rugged- 
termed  philosophies,  no  devotionalism,  no  religiosity  of 
any  sort.  Mindful  only  of  grand  phenomena  which  no 
one  doubts  —  of  fear,  hope,  love,  patriotism,  heaven,  wife, 
child,  mother,  clouds,  sunlight,  flowers,  water  —  these 
poems  tinkle  along  like  Coleridge's 

" hidden  brook 

In  the  leafy  month  of  June, 

That  to  the  sleeping  woods  all  night 

Singeth  a  gentle  tune." 

This  last  word  indeed  hints  at  what  is  one  of  the  dis- 
tinctive characteristics  of  all  Mr.  Hayne's  poetry.  It 
is  essentially,  thoroughly,  and  charmingly  tuneful.  In  a 
time  when  popular  poetry  is  either  smug  and  pretty,  or 
philosophically  obscure  and  rliythmically  rugged,  this 
quality  becomes  almost  unique.  There  is  indeed  nearly 
the  same  difference  between  poetry  and  culture-poetry 
that  exists  between  music  and  counterpoint-music.  Cul- 
ture-poetry, like  counterpoint-music,  is  scarcely  ever 
satisfactory  to  the  ear ;  it  is  not  captivating  with  that  inde- 


204  Music  and  Poetry 

scribable  music  which  can  come  out  of  the  rudest  heart, 
but  which  cannot  come  out  of  the  most  cultivated  head. 
This  feature  alone  would  suffice  to  separate  the  book 
before  us  from  the  great  mass  of  utterances  which 
polished  people  who  are  not  poets  are  daily  pouring 
upon  the  air. 

We  should  like  to  illustrate  Mr.  Hayne's  faculty  by 
quoting  entire  his  Fire- Pic  tares,  a  poem  which  in 
point  of  variety  and  delicacy  of  fancy  is  quite  the  best  of 
this  collection,  and  in  point  of  pure  music  should  be 
placed  beside  Edgar  Poe's  Bells.  Of  course,  to  one 
who  has  warmed  his  winters  by  nothing  more  glorious 
than  coal ;  to  one  who  has  never  sate  in  dreamful  mood 
and  watched  the  progress  of  a  great  hickory  fire  from 
the  fitful  fuliginous  beginning  thereof,  through  the  white 
brilliance  of  its  prime  and  the  red  glory  of  its  decline, 
unto  the  ashen-gray  death  of  the  same,  this  poem  is  un- 
intelligible ;  but  to  one  who  has,  its  fancies  and  its  music 
will  come  home  with  a  thousand  hearty  influences.  We 
regret  that  it  is  too  long  to  quote  here.  It  is  a  poem 
to  be  read  aloud ;  a  true  recitativo.  The  energy  of  its 
movements,  the  melody  of  its  metres,  the  changes  of  its 
rhythm,  the  variety  of  its  fancies,  the  artistic  advance  to 
its  climax,  particularly  the  management  of  its  close,  where 
at  one  and  the  same  time,  by  the  devices  of  onomatopeia 
and  of  rhythmical  imitation,  are  doubly  interpreted  the 
sob  of  a  man  and  the  flicker  of  a  flame  so  perfectly  that 
sob,  flicker,  word,  rhythm,  each  appears  to  represent  the 
other,  and  to  be  used  convertibly  with  the  other  in  such 
will-o'-wisp  transfigurations  as  quite  vanish  in  mere  de- 
scription,—  all  these  elements  require  for  full  enjoyment 
that  the  actual  music  of  the  poem  should  tall  upon  the 
ear. 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  205 

Some  of  the  changes  of  rhythm  above  referred  to 
merit  especial  mention,  and  start  some  considerations 
which  we  regret  the  Hmits  of  this  paper  will  not  allow  us 
to  pursue.  Suffice  it  here  to  remark  that  whenever  an 
English-speaking  person  grows  unusually  solemn  or 
intense  he  instinctively  resorts  to  the  iambic  rhythm  for 
expression.  Note,  for  instance,  how  in  number  11.  at 
the  close  the  change  from  the  trochees  to  the  two  iambi 
"  aspire  !  aspire  !  "  at  once  represents  the  intensity  of 
the  situation  and  the  broken  fitfulness  of  the  struggling 
flame  ;  or,  again,  in  that  fine  scene  of  number  IV.,  where 
the  iambi  "  dark-red  like  blood "  give  the  reader  a 
sudden  wrench  from  the  trochaic  flow  as  if  they  plucked 
him  by  the  sleeve  to  compel  him  to  stop  a  second  on  the 
thought ;  or,  again,  most  notable  of  all,  in  number  VI., 
where  from  the  words  "  a  stir,  a  murmur  deep  "  to  the 
close  of  the  picture  the  iambi  present  the  agony  and  the 
glory  of  the  martyr.  With  these  three  exceptions  the 
entire  poem  is  in  trochees,  and  is  an  admirable  example 
of  the  music  which  can  be  made  with  those  elements. 
Return  to  number  IX.  of  this  poem,  from 

"  Like  a  rivulet  rippling  deep, 
Through  the  meadow-lands  of  sleep," 

to  its  close  is,  in  point  of  pure  trochaic  music,  of  rare 

excellence.     We  desire,  however,  to  call    Mr.  Hayne's 

attention  to  a  fault  of  tone  which  occurs  in  this  picture, 

and  in  another  of  the  poems  of  this  book.     Wliere  the 

lines  run  : 

"  Though  the  lotos  swings  its  stem 
With  a  lulling  stir  of  Um'es, 
Though  the  lady-lily  laves 
Coy.  feet  in  the  crystal  waves. 
And  a  silvery  undertune 
From  some  mystic  wind-song  ^/«/«," 


2o6  Music  and  Poetry 

"  leaves  "  of  course  is  intended  to  rhyme  with  "  grieves," 
four  lines  down,  and  "  laves "  with  "  waves ;"  but 
"  laves  "  is  the  next  rhyme-tone  to  "  leaves,"  and  this 
proximity  renders  it  obnoxious  to  two  objections.  One 
is,  that  it  leaves  the  reader  for  a  moment  in  doubt 
whether  "  laves  "  is  really  intended  to  rhyme  with  "  leaves  " 
—  a  doubt  which  interferes  with  the  reader's  enjoyment 
as  long  as  it  lasts.  The  other  and  stronger  objection  is, 
that  the  immediate  juxtaposition  of  the  slightly-varying 
rhyme-tones  "  leaves  "  and  "  laves  "  gives  the  ear  the 
same  displeasure  which  the  eye  suffers  from  two  shades  of 
the  same  color  in  a  lady's  dress, —  both  tones  seem  faded. 
The  faults  of  Fire  Pictures  are  faults  which  we  de- 
tect in  all  Mr.  Hayne's  poetry ;  and  as  they  are  remedi- 
able, we  call  his  attention  to  them  with  all  the  more 
vigor.  They  are  of  two  classes.  First,  we  observe  a 
frequently-recurring  lapsus  of  thought,  in  which  Mr. 
Hayne  falls  into  trite  similes,  worn  collocations  of  words, 
and  commonplace  sentiments.  To  have  these  hack- 
neyed couples  of  words  and  ideas  continually  popping 
in  upon  us  out  of  Mr.  Hayne's  beautiful  things  is  to  suf- 
fer the  chagrin  and  the  anguish  of  that  hapless  man 
who  in  the  hot  summer  rushes  afar  from  toil  and  trouble 
across  the  ocean  into  a  distant  land,  and  there  in  the 
heavenly  weather,  while  idly  wandering  down  some  wild 
and  lovely  glen,  given  up  to  all  tender  meditations,  sud- 
denly, on  pushing  aside  a  great  frond  of  fern,  comes 
bump  upon  the  smug  familiar  faces  of  Smith,  Jones,  and 
Brown,  whom  he  had  left  amid  the  hot  grind  of  the 
street,  and  whose  presence  immediately  transports  him 
back  to  the  sweaty  moil  of  stocks,  bacon,  and  dry-goods. 
Such  expressions  are  :  "  changing  like  a  wizard-thought," 
or,    "  like   a   charmed    thought,"    or   "  like   a   Protean 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  207 

thought,"  and  others  in  Fire  Pictures.     More  notable 

still  in  this  respect  is  the  poem  Renewed.     The  first 

four  lines  of  this  poem  are  so  entirely  commonplace  that 

they  are  quite  sufficient  to  throw  any  reader  off  the  scent 

and  cause  him  to  abandon  the  piece  \  yet  the  very  next 

four  are   exceedingly  beautiful,   with  all  the  clear  and 

limpid  music  of  Mr.  Hayne's  style,  and  with  a  bright 

change  in  the  rhythm  which  is  full  of  happy  effects. 

Witness : 

RENEWED 

Welcome,  rippling  sunshine! 

Welcome,  joyous  air! 

Like  a  demon-shadow 

Flies  the  gaunt  Despair  I 
Heaven  throttgh  heights  of  happy  calm 

Its  heart  of  hearts  uncloses. 
To  win  earth's  answering  love,  in  balm, 

Her  blushing  thanks,  in  roses  I 

The  second  fault  to  which  we  wish  to  call  Mr.  Hayne's 
attention  is  diffuseness,  principally  originating  in  a  lav- 
ishness  and  looseness  of  adjectives.  Whatever  may  be 
said  of  Edgar  Poe's  theory  of  the  impossibility  of  a  long 
poem,  or  that  all  long  poems  are  merely  series  of  short 
poems  connected  by  something  that  is  not  poetry,  it  may 
at  least  with  safety  be  asserted  that  in  a  time  when  trade 
has  lengthened  life  by  shortening  leisure,  the  ideal  of  the 
lyric  poem  is  a  brief,  sweet,  intense,  electric  flashing  of 
the  lyric  idea  in  upon  the  hurrying  intelligence  of  men, 
so  that  the  vivid  truth  may  attack  even  an  unwilling 
retina,  and  perpetuate  itself  thereupon  even  after  the 
hasty  eyelid  has  closed  to  shut  out  the  sight.  Now, 
either  a  free  or  an  inexact  use  of  adjectives  is  a  depart- 
ure from  this  ideal,  not  only  because  it  impairs  the 
strength  of  the  articulate  idea,  but  because  it  so  far  cum- 


2o8  Music  and  Poetry 

bers  the  whole  poem  as,  if  the  fault  extends  throughout, 
to  render  it  too  long  to  be  readable  by  many  of  those 
whom  all  true  poets  desire  to  reach.  Notable  instances 
of  Mr.  Hayne's  dereliction  in  this  regard  may  be  found 
in  his  frequent  and  often  inexact  employment  of  the 
words  "  cordial,"  "weird,"  and  "  fairy  "  in  these  poems. 
One  can  easily  trace  the  manner  in  which  this  vice  escapes 
the  poet's  attention.  Busied  with  some  central  idea, 
and  hurried  by  the  passion  of  creating,  he  will  not  hesi- 
tate for  a  descriptive  in  some  minor  phrase,  but  dashes 
down  the  first  term  that  occurs,  if  it  will  but  answer  tol- 
erably, so  that  presently,  from  habit,  a  certain  favored 
few  adjectives  come  to  understand,  as  it  were,  that  this 
duty  is  expected  of  them,  and  get  trained  to  stand  by  and 
help  whenever  the  poet's  mind  is  fatigued  or  hurried. 

Perhaps  the  nearest  approaches  to  the  ideal  of  lyric 
poetry  in  this  book  are  the  invocation  to  the  wife  with 
which  it  commences  —  as  it  were,  grace  before  meat  — 
and  the  poem  called  A  Summer  Mood,  based  on  a  line 
from  Thomas  Heyvvard  :  "  Now,  by  my  faith,  a  grue- 
some mood  for  summer,"  From  the  latter  we  quote  a 
line  out  of  the  third  verse  and  the  last  three  verses :  — 

"The  sunshine  mocks  the  tears  it  may  not  dry, 

"  The  field-birds  seem  to  twit  us  as  they  pass, 
With  their  small  blisses,  piped  so  clear  and  loud: 
The  cricket  triumphs  o'er  us  in  the  grass; 
And  the  lark  glancing  beam-like  up  the  cloud, 

"  Sings  us  to  scorn  with  his  keen  rhapsodies  : 
Small  things  and  great  unconscious  tauntings  bring 
To  edge  our  cares,  whilst  we,  the  proud  and  wise, 
Envy  the  insect's  joy,  the  birdling's  wing  I 

"  And  thus  for  evermore,  till  time  shall  cease, 
Man's  soul  and  Nature's  —  each  a  separate  sphere  — 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  209 

Revolves,  the  one  in  discord,  one  in  peace, 

—  And  who  shall  make  the  solemn  mystery  clear  ?  " 

The  stanza  of  this  poem  in  which  "  the  field-birds  twit 
us  as  they  pass,  with  their  small  blisses,"  is  a  genuine 
snatch  caught  from  out  the  sedges  of  a  Southern  field, 
where  we  doubt  not  Mr.  Hayne  has  often  strolled  or  lain, 
companioned  only  by  the  small  crooked-flighted  sparrow, 
whose  whistle,  so  keen  that  it  amounts  to  a  hiss,  seems 
to  have  suggested  the  very  sibillations  of  the  s's  so  fre- 
quently occurring. 

In  In  Utroque  Fidelis  is  beautifully  blended  a  tone 
of  tranquil  description  with  that  of  a  passionate  love- 
song.  A  lover  about  to  be  off  to  the  wars  has  stolen  at 
midnight  to  snatch  a  farewell  glance  at  the  home  of  his 
beloved.  The  following  four  verses  show  something  of 
the  art  of  the  poem  :  — 

"  I  waft  a  sigh  from  this  fond  soul  to  thine, 
A  little  sigh,  yet  honey-laden,  dear, 
With  fairy  freightage  of  such  hopes  divine 
As  fain  would  flutter  gently  at  thine  car, 

And  entering  find  their  way 
Down  to  the  heart  so  veiled  from  me  by  day. 

"  In  dreams,  in  dreams,  perchance  thou  are  not  coy ; 
And  one  keen  hope  more  bold  than  all  the  rest 
May  touch  thy  spirit  with  a  tremulous  joy. 
And  stir  an  answering  softness  in  thy  breast. 

O  sleep,  O  blest  eclipse  I 
What  murmured  word  is  faltering  at  her  lips? 

"  Still,  breathless  still !     No  voice  in  earth  or  air : 
I  only  know  my  delicate  darling  lies, 
A  twilight  lustre  glimmering  in  her  hair, 
And  dews  of  peace  within  her  languid  eyes  : 

Yea,  only  know  that  I 
Am  called  from  love  and  dreams  perhaps  to  die, 

14 


aio  Music  and  Poetry 

"  Die  when  the  heavens  are  thick  with  scarlet  rain, 
And  every  time-throb  's  fated  :  even  there 
Her  face  would  shine  through  mists  of  mortal  pain, 
And  sweeten  death  like  some  incarnate  prayer. 

Hark !     'T  is  the  trumpet's  swell ! 
O  love,  O  dreams,  farewell,  farewell,  farewell !  " 

In  the  particular  of  tranquil  description,  however,  some 
good  work  occurs  in  the  ode  to  Sleep.  Witness  the 
following  extracts,  which  form  the  beginning  and  the 
end  of  the  poem  :  — 

"  Beyond  the  sunset  and  the  amber  sea, 
To  the  lone  depths  of  ether,  cold  and  bare, 
Thy  influence,  soul  of  all  tranquillity, 
Hallows  the  earth  and  awes  the  reverent  air. 

Then  woo  me  here  amid  these  flowery  charms  ; 

Breathe  on  my  eyelids,  press  thine  odorous  lips 

Close  to  mine  own,  enfold  me  in  thine  arms. 

And  cloud  my  spirit  with  thy  sweet  eclipse ; 

And  while  from  waning  depth  to  depth  I  fall, 

Down-lapsing  to  the  utmost  depths  of  all. 

Till  wan  forgetfulness,  obscurely  stealing, 

Creeps  like  an  incantation  on  the  soul,  — 

And  o'er  the  slow  ebb  of  my  conscious  life 

Dies  the  thin  flush  of  the  last  conscious  feeling,  — 

And,  like  abortive  thunder,  the  dull  roll 

Of  sullen  passions  ebbs  far,  far  away,  — 

O  Angel  1  loose  the  chords  which  cling  to  strife. 

Sever  the  gossamer  bondage  of  my  breath. 

And  let  me  pass,  gently  as  winds  in  May, 

From  the  dim  realm  which  owns  thy  shadowy  sway. 

To  thy  diviner  sleep,  O  sacred  Death  I  " 

We  would  like  to  praise  Glaucus  for  the  fine  spirit-of- 

green-leaves,  which  makes  the  poem  so  dainty  and  shady 

and    cool.     We  would  like,   too,   to    discuss  with    Mr. 

Hayne  whether  the  climacteric  point  in  the  tale  of  the 

Wife   of  Brittany,  —  which   is   the  moment  when  the 


Paul  H.  Hayne's  Poetry  211 

Wife  meets  Aurelian  for  the  purpose  of  performing  her 
dreadful  promise  —  does  not  need  a  more  dramatic 
accentuation  to  relieve  it  from  the  danger  of  anti-climax 
to  which  this  wonderfully  smooth  narrative  is  liable  at 
that  point.  We  could  wish  further  to  commend  the 
admirably  harmonized  tone  of  Frexaspes,  where  the 
words  seem  at  once  hot,  wan,  cruel,  and  wicked ;  and 
the  elegant  rendering  of  A'ethra,  which  is  quite  the  most 
artistically  told  tale  in  the  book ;  and  the  reverent  piety 
which  shines  in  the  final  oftering  to  the  poet's  mother ; 
and  many  other  things.  But  this  paper  has  already 
reached  its  limit.  We  may  be  permitted  in  closing  it  to 
observe  that  already  since  the  publication  of  Legends  and 
Lyrics,  other  poems  of  Mr.  Hayne's  have  appeared,  as 
for  example  the  two  Forest  Fictures  in  the  Atlantic 
Monthly,  which  exhibit  a  growing  strength  and  more 
vigorous  realism  in  his  poetic  faculty ;  and  we  venture 
to  express  the  hope  that  his  pen  may  yet  embody  the 
pretty  fancy  of  his  poem  called 

THE  NEST 

At  the  poet's  life-core  lying, 

Is  a  sheltered  and  sacred  nest, 
Where,  as  yet  unfledged  for  flying, 

His  callow  fancies  rest  — 

Fancies  and  thoughts  and  feelings 

\Vhich  the  mother  Psyche  breeds, 
And  passions  whose  dim  rcvealings 

But  torture  their  hungry  needs. 

Yet  there  cometh  a  summer  splendor 
When  the  golden  brood  wax  strong, 

And,  with  voices  grand  or  tender, 
They  rise  to  the  heaven  of  song. 


212  Music  and   Poetry 


XIII 

John  Barbour's  Bruce 


About  the  time  when  our  own  Geoffrey  Chaucer  was 
working  at  his  Canterbury  Tales,  and  John  WycUf  and 
his  disciples  were  translating  the  Bible  into  common 
English,  and  William  Langley  was  revising  his  Piers 
Plowjnan ;  when  Sir  John  Froissart  over  in  France  was 
writing  his  Chronicles  ;  when,  in  Italy,  Dante  had  been 
dead  some  fifty  years,  and  Petrarch  had  just  stopped 
singing,  John  Barbour,  in  Scotland,  was  writing  that 
dear  and  simple  Romance  which  treats  —  as  the  old 
manuscript  says  at  the  head,  —  *'  of  the  deeds,  wars, 
and  virtues  of  lord  Robert  the  Brvvyss,^  most  illustrious 
King  of  Scotland,  and  of  the  conquest  of  the  kingdom 
of  Scotland  by  the  same,  and  of  the  lord  James  the 
Douglas."  It  was  then  but  a  few  years  since  the  two 
heroes  of  whom  Barbour  sang  had  acted,  and  fought, 
and  loved  virtue :  about  as  if  Mr.  Longfellow  should 
make  a  poem  on  the  adventures  of  some  soldier  in  our 
own  War  of  1812.  Barbour  was  probably  near  thirteen 
years  old  when  Robert  Bruce  died,  in  1329  j  and  the 
main  events  of  his  poem  are  those  wonderful  struggles 
of  Bruce  during  the  earlier  years  of  the  same  century 
against  King  Edward  I.,  and  after  that  monarch's  death 

1  Bruce. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  213 

against  King  Edward  11.,  until  the  defeat  of  the  latter 
at  Bannockburn  in  13 14  left  the  hardy  Robert  secure 
on  the  Scottish  throne. 

Of  John  Barbour's  life  we  know  little  besides  the  facts 
that  he  was  Archdeacon  of  Aberdeen,  and  that  he  wrote 
a  metrical  account  of  the  Scotch  rulers  beginning  with 
Brutus  called  The  Brute,  and  a  poem  on  The  Lives 
of  The  Northern  Saints,  —  besides  this  poem  of  The 
Bruce. 

But  when  we  read  this  last  work  we  do  not  feel  that 
we  lack  any  further  knowledge  to  make  us  acquainted 
with  John  Barbour.  About  a  hundred  and  fifty  years 
before  Barbour  a  very  fervent  English  poet  named 
Orrmin  called  his  poem  TJie  Onnulum,  or  little  Orrmin, 
as  if  it  were  a  sort  of  miniature  copy  of  himself;  and  so 
we  might  call  Barbour's  Romance  the  Barbulum.  It 
shows  him  to  us  over  again.  We  see  clearly  how  simple, 
how  lofty,  how  clean  are  all  his  thoughts ;  how  fervent 
are  his  love  and  admiration  of  all  manful  deeds ;  how 
keen  and  intelligent  are  his  ideas  of  the  remarkable 
degree  in  which  Robert  Bruce  added  perseverance, 
prudence,  ready  wit  in  emergencies,  wisdom  in  hand- 
ling his  resources,  to  his  personal  bravery  and  physical 
strength ;  how  true  is  his  passion  for  freedom ;  and 
how  fine  and  large  is  his  ideal  of  manhood  as  given  in 
his  account  of  James  the  Douglas. 

Here  for  instance  is  a  tale  from  the  earlier  portion 
of  the  poem,  in  which  we  see  not  only  the  valorous 
deeds  and  rude  hardships  of  Bruce,  but  the  perfect 
fellow-feeling  of  Barbour;  and  it  is  easy  to  believe 
that  the  poet  would  not  have  fought  far  from  the  hero's 
side  if  he  had  been  in  that  trying  march  when  Bruce, 
single-handed,  covered    the   retreat   of  his    little    band 


214  Music  and  Poetry 

from  the  incessant  charges  of  the  Lord  of  Lome  and 
his  troopers.  The  poem  has  told  how  upon  the  death 
of  King  Alexander  IIL, 

The  land  six  years,  and  more  fer/aith, 
The  land  vi  yer,  and  mayr  perfay, 

Lay  desolate  after  his  day  ; 
Lay  desolat  eftyr  hys  day  ; 

how  the  baronage  quarrelled  as  to  who  should  have  the 
kingdom,  and  finally  left  the  decision  to  King  Edward 
of  England,  who  at  first  made  a  foul  proposal  to  Robert 
Bruce  —  grandfather  of  our  Robert  — 

And  to  Robert  the  Bruce  said  he, 
And  to  Robert  the  brwyss  said  he, 

"  If  thou  wilt  hold  in  chief  of  me 

"  Gyff  thow  will  held  in  chayff  off  me 

For  evermore,  and  thine  offspring. 
For  euirmar,  and  thine  ofspryng, 

I  shall  do  so  (that)  thou  shall  be  king  ;^ 
I  sal  do  swa        thow  sail  be  king ; " 

and  how  Bruce  answered  — 

"  Sir^'  said  he,  "so  God  me  save, 
"  Schyr,"  said  he,  "  sa  god  me  save, 

The  kingdom  yearn  I  not  to  have 
The  kynryk  yharn  I  nocht  to  have 

But  if  (unless)  it  fall,  of  right,  to  me; 
Bot  gyfE  It  fall  off  rycht  to  me : 

And   if  God  will  that  it  so  be. 
And  gyff  god  will  that  It  sa  be, 

I  shall  as  freely  in  all  things 
I  sail  als  frely  in  all  thing 

Hold  it  as  it  behoz'es  a  king, 
Hold  It  as  It  afferis  to  king. 


John   Barbour's  Bruce  215 

Or  as  mine  elders  before  me 
Or  as  myn  eldris  forouch  me 

Held  it  in  freest  royalty. 
Held  It  in  freyast  reawte." 

Hereupon  King  Edward,  in  wrath,  decided  for  Baliol, 
who  had  agreed  to  be  King  Edward's  man ;  but  these 
two  soon  fell  out,  Baliol  was  degraded,  and  Scotland  lay 
at  King  Edward's  mercy, 

"  All  defawtit  &  wndone," 

in  a  condition  of  slavery  and  ruin  which  Barbour  paints 
with  vigorous  strokes.  Sir  William  Douglas,  father  of 
Sir  James  who  presently  does  such  heroic  deeds,  is  slain, 
and  the  Douglas  land  given  to  English  Clifford;  King 
Edward  has  the  country 

"  Stufiyt  all  with  Inglis  men," 

who  seize  the  property,  even  the  wives  and  daughters, 
of  the  Scots,  and  rob  and  slay  without  hindrance. 
Then 

This  lord  the  Bnice  I  spoke  of,  ere,  ^ 
Thys  lord  the  brwyss  I  spak  of  ayr, 

Saw  all  the  hitigdom  so  decay ^ 
Saw  all  the  kynryk  swa  forfayr, 

And  so  troubled  the  folk  sa7v  he 
And  swa  trowblyt  the  folk  saw  he 

77ial  he  thereof  had  fi^eat  pity. 
That  he  tharoff  had  gret  pitte. 

But  what  pity  that  ever  he  had. 
But  quhat  pite  that  euir  he  had, 

No  countenance  thereof  he  made, 
Na  contcnancc  thar-off  he  maid ; 

'  Here  Barbour  forjjcts  that  the  Briire  he  spoke  of  ere  was  the  grand- 
father of  the  famous  Bruce.     It  is  the  latter  he  now  goes  on  to  speak  of. 


2i6  Music  and   Poetry 

Till  on  a  time  Sir  John  Cummyti, 
Till  on  A  tym  Schyr  Ihone  Cumyn, 

As  they  came  ridinj^frotn  Stirling, 
As  thai  come  ridand  fra  strewillyn, 

Said  to  him,  "  Sir,  will  ye  not  see 
Said  till  him,  "  schyr,  will  ye  nocht  se 

Hoiv  that  governed  is  this  countree  ?  " 
How  that  gouernyt  is  this  countre  ? " 

But  as  soon  as  Bruce,  touched  with  pity,  signs  an 
"  Indenture "  agreeing  to  take  his  right  place  on  the 
throne  and  receives  the  oaths  of  the  barons,  treacherous 
John  Cummyn  reveals  all  to  the  king  at  London.  Bruce 
being  soon  afterward  in  that  city  is  confronted  by  the 
king  with  the  fatal  Indenture,  and  only  saves  himself 
by  asking,  with  the  readiest  wit,  that  he  may  be  allowed  to 
compare  the  seal  with  his  own  at  his  lodging.  Here  he 
stays  not  for  seals,  but  leaps  upon  his  horse,  flies  to 
Scotland,  and  showing  John  Cummyn  the  fatal  Indenture 
slays  him  with  a  knife  even  as  he  stands  at  the  church- 
altar. 

The  ball  now  opens.  Bruce  is  openly  crowned  king 
of  Scotland  at  Scone,  and  presently  King  Edward,  in  a 
rage  over  the  death  of  John  Cummyn,  sends  an  army 
into  Scotland,  which  Bruce  meets  at  Methven.  Here, 
greatly  outnumbered.  King  Robert  is  defeated  and  must 
fly  to  the  hills.  Presently,  when  the  most  part  of  his 
"  mengye  "  —  that  is,  his  meinie,  a  very  common  term 
in  Barbour's  time  for  any  troop  or  band  of  men  following 
a  leader  —  was  nearly  gone,  and  the  men  were  without 
shoes,  they  go  to  Aberdeen,  where  their  wives  are.  But 
here  is  no  rest :  they  must  soon  flee ;  and  now,  with  the 
ladies, 

That  for  leal  love  and  loyalty 
That  for  leyle  luff  and  leawte, 


John  Barbour's   Bruce  217 

Would  partners  of  their  pains  be, 
Wald  partenerys  off  thar  paynys  be. 

His  men  in  haste  he  caused  be  dight  {armed). 
His  men  in  hy   he    gert   be  dycht. 

And  busked  him  {got  ready)  from  the  town 

to  ride, 
And  buskyt  of  the  toune 

to  ryd, 

The  ladies  rode  right  by  his  side. 
The  ladyis  raid  rycht  by  his  syd. 

Then  to  the  hill  they  rode  their  way. 
Then  to  the  hill  thai  raid  thar  way. 

Where  great  default  of  meat  had  they. 
Quhar  gret  defaut  off  mete  had  thai. 

Btit  worthy  James  of  Douglas 
Bot  worthy  lames  off  douglas 

Aye  travailing  and  busy  was 
Ay  trawailland  and  besy  was, 

For  to  purchase  (procure)  the  ladies  meat; 
For  to  purches  the  ladyis  mete  ; 

And  it  on  many  wise  (ways)  would  get. 
And  It  on  mony  wiss  wald  get. 

For  {one)  while  he  venison  them  brought. 
For  quhile  he  venesoun  tliaini  brocht : 

Attd  with  his  hands  {another)  while  he  wrought 
And  with  his  handys  quhile  he  wrocht 

Gins  {snares  or  traps)  to  take  pike  and  salmons, 
Gynnys,  to  tak  geddis  &  salmonys, 

Trouts,  eels,  and  also  minnows. 
Trowtis,  elys,  and  als  menovnys. 

And  the  king  oft  comforted  was 
And  the  king  oft  confort  wcs 


2i8  Music  and  Poetry 

Through  his  wit  and  his  biisitiess  (busy-ness). 
Throw  his  wyt,  and  his  besynes. 

On  this  manner  them  governed  they 
On  this  maner  thaim  gouernyt  thai, 

Till  they  came  to  the  head  of  Tay. 
Till  thai  come  to  the  hed  off  tay. 


How  John  of  Lorne  disconfite  King  Robert.i 

The  lord  of  Lome  dwells  thereby 
The  lord  off  lorne  wonnyt  thar-by, 

That  was  capital  enemy 
That  was  capitale  ennymy 

To  the  king,  for  his  uncle's  sake. 
To  the  king,  for  his  Emys  sak, 

fohn  Cummyn  ;  and  thought  for  to  take 
Ihon  comyn ;     and  thocht  for  to  tak 

Vengeance,  upon  cruel  manner. 
Wengeance,  apon  cruell  maner. 

When  he  the  king  wist  (knew)  was  so  near 
Quhen  he  the  king  wyst  wes  sa  ner, 

He  assembled  his  mett  in  hy  (haste)  ; 
He  assemblyt  his  men  in  hy ; 

And  had  into  his  compatjy 
And  had  in-till  his  cumpany 

The    barons      of  Argyle    also; 
The  barownys  off  Argyle  alsua ; 

TTiey  were  a  thousand  well  (full)  or  more  ; 
Thai  war  A  thowsand  weill  or  ma : 

And  came  for  to  surprise  the  king. 
And  come  for  to  suppriss  the  king, 

1  This  rubric  occurs  in  the  Edinburgh  manuscript. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  219 

TTiat  well  was  ware  of  their  coming. 
That  Weill  wes  war  of  thar  cummyng. 
•        •        •        •        • 

The  king's  folk  full  well  them  bore. 
The  kingis  folk  full  weill  thaim  bar, 

And  slew,  and  felled,  and  woimded  sore. 
And  slew,  and  fellyt,  and  woundyt  sar. 

But  the  folk  of  the  totker  party 
Bot  the  folk  off  the  tothir  party 

Fought  with  axes  sofelonly', 
Fawcht  with  axys  sa  [felounly], 

For  they  on  foot  were  every  ane  {one), 
For  thai  on  fute  war  euir-Ilkane, 

That  theyfele  {?nany)  of  their  horse  has  slain. 
That  thai  feile  off  thar  horss  has  slayne ; 

And  to  some  gave  they  wounds  wide. 
And  till  sum  gaiff  thai  woundis  wid. 

James  of  Douglas  was  hurt  that  tide  {time) ; 
lames  off  dowglas  wes  hurt  that  tyd  ; 

And  also  Sir  Gilbert  de  la  Hay. 
And  als  Schyr  gilbert  de  la  hay. 

77/1?  king  his  men  saw  in  affray  {affright). 
The  [king  his]  men  saw  in  affray, 

And  his  wa)--cry  began  he  {to)  cry 
And  his  ensenye^  can  he        cry; 

And  amovg  them  right  hardily 
And  amang  thaim  rycht  hardyly 

He  rode  that  he  them  drove  back,  all. 
He  rad,  that  he  thaim  ruschyt  all; 

And  many  of  them  there  made  he  fall. 
And  fcle  of  thaim  thar  gert   he  fall. 

1  From  the  French  enseigne,  a  sign,  or  token. 


220  Music  and   Poetry 

B»t  when  he  saw  they  were  sofde  ^  {many), 
Bot  quhen  he  saw  thai  war  sa  feill, 

Axd  sa-M  them  such  ip-eat  dints  {strokes')  deal. 
And  saw  thaim  swa  grct  dyntis  deill, 

He  dread(ed)  to  lose  his  folk  ;  for-thi  {for  this,  therefore) 
He  dred         to  tyne  his  folk,  forthi 

His  men  to  him  he  'gan  rally. 
His  men  till  him  he  gan  rely, 

And  said :  "  Lordings,  folly  it  were 
And  said  :  "  Lordyngis,  foly  It  War 

To  us  for  to  assemble  mair  (more), 
Tyll  ws  for  till  assembill  mar, 

For  theyfele  [many)  of  our  horse  has  slain  ; 
For  thai  fele  off  our  horss  has  slayn  ; 

And  if    we  fight  with  them  again 
And  gyff  [we]  fecht  with  thaim  agayn, 

We  shall  lose  of  our  small  meinie  {following 
We  sail  tyne  off  our  small  mengye, 

And  our-self  shall  in  peril  be. 
And  our-selff  sail  in  perill  be."^ 

Then  they  withdrew  them  wholly. 
Then  thai  withdrew  thaim  halely : 

But  that  was  not  ftdl  cowardly, 
Bot  that  wes  nocht  full  cowartly, 

For  together  into  a  band  held  they 
For  samyn  in-till  A  sop  held  thai ; 

And  the  king  him  abandoned  {devoted  himself)  aye 
And  the  king  him  abandonyt  ay 

1  Young  readers  who  are  studying  German  will  recognize  this  as  from 
the  same  stock  with  the  German  word  viel,  many. 

2  The  contrast  between  this  wonderful  pnidence  of  Bruce — he  never 
lost  his  head  — and  the  tremendous  personal  valor  and  strength  of  the 
deeds  next  done  by  him  is  finely  brought  out  by  Barbour. 


John  Barbour's   Bruce  221 

To  defend  behind  {guard  the  rear  of)  his  meinie. 
To  defend  behind  his  mengye. 

And  through  his  worship  {worth-ship)  so  wrought  he 
And  throw  his  worschip  sa  wrouch[t]  he 

That  he  rescued  all  the  flee-ers  {fleeing  men) 
That  he  reskewyt  all  the  flearis, 

And  stopped  sogate  {in  such  a  gate,  or  manner)  the  chasers 
And  styntyt  swagat  the  chassaris, 

That  none  durst  out  of  battle  {out  of  ranks)  chase, 
That  nane  durst  owt  off  batall  chass. 

For  always  at  their  hand  he  was. 
For  alwayis  at  thar  hand  he  was. 

Two  brothers  were  into  that  land 
Twa  brethir  war  [into]  that  land 

That  were  the  hardiest  of  hayid 
That  war  the  hardiest  off  hand 

That  were  into  all  that  coutitrie ; 
That  war  in-till  all  that  cuntre ; 

And  they  had  sworn,  if  they  might  see 
And  thai  had  sworn,  iff  thai  micht  se 

The  Bruce  where  they  viight  him  o'erta'  {take), 
The  bruyss,  quhar  thai  mycht  him  our-ta, 

That  they  should  die,  or  then  him  slay. 
That  thai  suld  day,  or  then  him  sla. 


Of  their  compact  a  third  had  they 
Off  thar  cowyne  the  thrid  had  thai 

That  was  right  stout,  ill  and  felony 
That  wes  rycht  stout,  111,  and  feloune. 

When  they  the  king  of  good  renown  ^ 
Quhen  thai  the  king  of  gud  renoune 

1  Many  words  which  rhymed  in  Barbour's  time  have  so  changed  their 
soimds  in  our  day  as  to  seem  bad  rhymes  to  his  modern  reader.  Barbour 
pronounced  thcic  words   iv\-6on  and  xcu-6on.     This  remark  applies  to 


C122  Music  and  Poetry 

Saw  so    behind  his  meinie    ride. 
Saw  sua  behind  his  mengne  rid, 

And  saw  him  turn  so  many  tide  (times), 
And  saw  him  tome  sa  mony  tid, 

They  abode  {waited)  till  that  he  was 
Thai  abaid  till  that  he  was 

Entered  in  a  narrow  place 
Entryt  in  ana  narow  place, 

Betwixt  a  loch-side  and  a  brae  (bank), 
Betuix  a  louchside  and  a  bra ; 

That  was  so  strait  (narrow),  I imderta^  (-take). 
That  wes  sa  strait,  Ik  wnderta ; 

That  he   might     not    well  turn  his  steed. 
That  he  mycht  nocht  weill  turn  his  sted. 

Thett  with  a  will  to  hitn  they  yede  (went)  ; 
Then  with  A  will  till  him  thai  yede  ; 

And  one  him  by  the  bridle  hent  (seized). 
And  ane  him  by  the  bridill  hynt : 

Btit  he  reached  to  him  such  a  dint  (stroke) 
Bot  he  raucht  till  him  sic  A  dynt, 

That  arm  and  shoulder  flciv  him  fra  (from). 
That  arme  and  schuldyr  flaw  him  fra. 

With  that  another  ^gan  him  ia'  (take) 
With  that  ane  othir  gan  him  ta 

By  the  leg,  and  his  hand  ^gan  shoot 
Be  the  lege,  and  his  hand  gan  schute 

Betwixt  the  stirrup  and  his  foot; 
Betuix  the  sterap  and  his  fute  : 

And  when  the  king  felt  there  his  hand. 
And  quhen  the  king  felt  thar  his  hand, 

many  rhymes  which  are  apparently  bad,  but  which  are  not  explained  in 
detail  because  I  have  desired  to  encumber  the  young  reader's  attention 
with  as  few  notes  as  possible. 


John   Barbour's  Bruce  223 

In  his  stirrups  stiffly  'gan  he  stand. 
In  his  sterapys  stythly  gan  he  stand, 

And  struck  with  spurs  the  steed  in  hy  {haste). 
And  strak  with  spuris  the  stede  in  hy ; 

And  he  lanced  {leapt)  forth  deliverly  {cleverly). 
And  he  lansyt  furth  delyuerly, 

So  that  the  tother  failed  {of )  feet  {lost  his  footing), 
Swa  that  the  tothir  failyeit  fete ; 

And  nevertheless  his  hand  was  yet 
And  nocht-for-thi  his  hand  wes  yeit 

Under  the  stirrup,  malgrS  his  (will,  spite  of  him). 
Wndyr  the  sterap,  magre  his. 

The  third,  with  full  great  haste,  with  this. 
The  thrid,  with  full  gret  hy,  with  this 

Rij:;ht  to  the  brae-side  he yede  {went), 
Rycht  till  the  bra  syd  he  yeid, 

And  leapt  behind  him  on  his  steed. 
And  stert  be-hynd  hym  on  his  sted. 

The  king  was  then  in  full  great  press  ; 
The  king  wes  then  in  full  gret  press; 

HcMever,  he  thought,  as  he  that  was 
The  quhethir  he  thocht,  as  he  that  wes 

In  all  his  deeds  well-advised 

In  all  his  dedys  awise  (pronounced  a-wi-say) 

To  do  an  outrageous  bounte  {very  great  deed). 
To  do  ane  owtrageouss  bounte. 

Au,l  then  him  that  behind  him  was, 
And  sync  hymc  that  behynd  hym  wass, 

All  maugre  his  will,  him  ^gan  he  raise 
All  magre  his  will,  him  gan  he  rass 

From  behind  him,  though  he  had  sworn  ;  ^ 
Fra  be-hynd  hym,  thocht  he  had  sworn, 

1  That  is,  with  such  force  that  though  the  Mclndrosser  had  sworn  to 
prevent  it,  he  could  not. 


224  Music  and  Poetry 

He  laid  him  r.'tii  him  beforn  {be/ore). 
He  laid  hym  ewyn  him  beforn. 

Then  with  the  sword  such  stroke  him  gave, 
Syne  with  the  suerd  sic  dynt  hym  gave, 

That  he  the  head  to  the  harness  clave. 
That  he  the  held  till  the  harnys  clave. 

He  rushid  down,  of  blood  all  red, 
He  rouschit  doun,  off  blud  all  rede. 

As  he  that  moment  felt  of  death. 
As  he  that  stound  feld  off  dede. 

And  then  the  king,  in  full  great  hy  (haste), 
And  then  the  king,  in  full  gret  hy, 

Struck  at  the  tother  vigorously, 
Strak  at  the  tothir  wigorusly, 

That  he  after  his  stirrup  drew, 
That  he  eftir  his  sterap  drew. 

That  at  the  first  stroke  he  him  slew. 
That  at  the  fyrst  strak  he  him  slew. 

On  this  wise  him  delivered  he 
On  this  wiss  him  delyuerit  he 

Of  all  those  felon  foes  three. 
Off  all  thai  felloun  fayis  thre. 

When  they  of  Lome  has  seen  the  king 
Quhen  thai  of  Lome  has  sene  the  king 

Set  in  himself  so  great  helpi?tg. 
Set  in  hym-selff  sa  gret  helping, 

And  defend  him  (self)  so  manlily, 
And  [defend]  him  sa  manlely ; 

Was  none  among  them  so  hardy 
Wes  nane  amang  thaim  sa  hardy 

That  durst  assail  him  more  in  fight ; 
That  durst  assailye  him  mar  in  fycht: 

So  dread  {ed)  they  for  his  mickle  might. 
Sa  dred  thai  for  his  mekill  mycht. 


John   Barbour's   Bruce  225 

There  was  a  Baron  Macnatightan 
Thar  wes  a  baroune  maknauchtan, 

That  in  his  heart  great  keep  {note)  has  ta^en 
That  in  his  hart  gret  kep  has  tane 

Unto  the  king's  chivalry, 
[^'"nto]  the  kingis  chewalry, 

And  prized  him  in  heart  greatly. 
And  prisyt  hym  in  hert  gretly. 

Then  'gan  the  lord  of  Lome  say: 
Then  gane  the  lord  off  lorn  say : 

"  It  seems  it  likes  thee,  per/ay, 
"  It  semys  It  likis  the  perfay, 

That  he  slays  yon-gate  (in  yon  manner)  our  meinie.'" 
That  he  slayis  yongat  our  mengye." 

"  Sir,"  said  he,  "  so  our  Lord  me  see  / 
"  Schyr,"  said  he,  "sa  our  lord  me  se  ! 

—  To  save  your  presence ,  —  it  is  not  so. 
To  sauff  your  presence,  It  is  nocht  swa. 

But  whether  he  befriend  or  foe, 

Bot  quhethir  sa  [he]  be  freynd  or  fa, 

That  wins  prize  of  chivalry. 
That  wynnys  pryss  off  chewalry, 

Alen  should  speak  thereof  loyally. 
Men  suld  spek  tharoff  lelyly. 

And  surely  in  all  my  time 
And  sekyrly  in  all  my  tyme, 

/  heard  never  in  song  nor  rhyme 
Ik  hard  neuir  in  sang  na  ryme, 

Tell  of  a  man  that  so  smartly 
Tell  off  A  man  that  swa  smertiy 

Achievid  so  great  chivalry!' 
Eschewyt  swa  gret  chewalry." 

'S 


226  Music  and  Poetry 

Sitih  sf  taking  of  the  king  they  made  ; 
Sic  speking  off  the  king  thai  maid : 

And  /le  after  his  nieinie  rade  (rode), 
And  he  eftyr  his  mcngye  raid; 

And  into  safety  them  led, 
And  in-till  saufte  thaim  led, 

Where  he  his  foes  nothing  dread  (ed). 
Quhar  he  his  fayis  na  thing  dred. 

And  they  of  Lome  again  are  gane  (gone), 
And  thai  off  lorne  agayn  ar  gayn, 

Moaning  the  scath  {harm)  that  they  have  ta'en. 
Menand  the  scaith  that  thai  haiff  tayn. 


II 

Of  King  Robert's  Pains  among  the  Mountains,  and  how 
THE  Ladies  and  the  Horses  were  sknt  away.^ 

The  king  that  night  his  watches  set, 
The  king  that  nycht  his  wachis  set, 
And garred  ordain  that  they  might  eat. 
And  gert  ordayne  that  thai  mycht  et ; 

And  bade  them  comfort  to  them  take 

And  bad  [thaim  comfort]  to  thaim  tak. 

And  at  their  mights  {as  best  they  might)  merry  make. 

And  at  thar  mychtis  mery  mak. 

"  For  discomfort"  —  then  said  he  — 
"  For  disconford,"  as  then  said  he, 
"/j  the  worst  thing  that  may  be. 
"  Is  the  werst  thing  that  may  be. 

For  through  mickle  disconfortlng, 
For  throw  mekill  disconforting 
Afen  ofttimes  falls  in  despairing. 
Men  fallis  off  in-to  disparyng. 

1  These  headings  are  fuller  than  those  in  the  manuscript. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  227 

Andfra  {soon  as)  a  man  despairid  be. 
And  fra  A  man  disparyt  be, 

Then  utterly  vanquished  is  he. 
Then  wtraly  wencusyt  Is  he. 

Andfra  the  heart  be  discomfit{ed). 
And  fra  the  hart  be  discumfyt, 
The  body  is  not  worth  a  mite. 
The  body  is  nocht  worth  A  myt. 

"  Therefore  "  —  he  said —  "  above  all  thing, 
"Tharfor,"  he  said,  "atour  all  thing, 
Keep  you  fra  despairing: 
Kepys  yow  fra  disparyng : 

And  think,  though  ive  noiv  harms  feel. 
And  thynk,  thouch  we  now  hannys  fele. 
That  God  may  yet  relieve  us  weel  (well). 
That  god  may  yeit  releve  ws  weill. 

Meti  reads  of  many  men  that  were 

Men  redys  off  mony  men  that  war 

Far  harder  stead  {bestead,  pushed)  than  we  yet  are; 

Fer  hardar  stad  then  we  yhet  ar ; 

And  since  (afterwards)  our  Lord  such  grace  them  lent 
And  syne  our  lord  sic  grace  thaim  lent. 

That  they  came  well  to  their  intent. 
That  thai  come  weill  till  thar  cntent. 

Thus  gate  them  comforted  the  king; 
Thusgat  thaim  confort[yt]  the  king  ; 
And,  to  comfort  them,  ^gan  in-bring 
And,  to  confort  thaim,  gan  Inbryng 

Old  stories  of  men  that  were 

Auld  storys  off  men  that  wer 

Set  into  hard  assays  (trials)  ser  (several). 

Set  in-tyll  hard  assayls        ser, 

Attd  that  Fortune  contraried  fast. 
And  that  forloun  contraryit  fast, 


228  Music  and  Poetry 

And  came  to  purpose  at  the  last. 
And  come  to  purposs  at  the  last. 


He  pn-achhi  them  on  this  manner 
He  prechyt  thaim  on  this  nianer ; 
Andfeignid  to  7nake  better  cheer 
And  fenyeit  to  mak  bettir  char, 

Than  he  had  tnatter  to,  by  far 

Then  he  had  matir  to,  be  fer : 

For  his  cause  went  fro7n  ill  to  waur  {worse). 

For  his  causs  yeid  fra  ill  to  war. 

They  were  aye  in  so  hard  travail. 
Thai  war  ay  in  sa  hard  trawaill, 
Till  the  ladies  began  to  fail, 
Till  the  ladyis  began  to  fayle, 

That  might  the  travail  dree  {endure)  7io  viair  {more) . 
That  mycht  the  trawaill  drey  na  mar ; 

So  did  other  also  that  tvere  there. 
Sa  did  othir  als  that  war  thar. 

The  Earl  John  was  07ie  of  tho  {those) 
The  Erie  Ihone  wes  ane  off  tha, 

—  Of  A  thai  —  that  when  he  saw  so 

—  Off  athole,  that  quhen  he  saw  sua 

The  king  be  disconifit{ed)  twice 
The  king  be  discumfyt  twyss, 
Andsofele  {many)  folk  against  him  rise, 
And  sa  feile  folk  agayne  him  ryss ; 

And  live  in  such  travail  and  doubt. 
And  lyff  in  sic  trawaill  and  dout, 
His  heart  begati  to  fail  all-out. 
His  hart  begane  to  faile  all-out. 

The  king  saw  that  he  so  was  failid. 

The  king  saw  that  he  sa  wes  failyt, 

And  that  he  eke  was  for-travailhi  {worn-out). 

And  that  he  Ik  wes  for-trawaillyt. 


John  Barbour's   Bruce  229 


He  said :  "  Sir  Earl,  we  shall  soon  see. 
He  said :  "  Sch)'r  Erie,  we  sail  sone  Se, 
A7id  ordain  how  it  best  may  be. 
&     ordayne  how  It  best  may  be. 

Wherever  yon  be,  our  Lord  yon  send 
Quhar-euir  ye  be,  our  lord  yow  send 
Grace,  from  your  foes  you  to  defend  !  " 
Grace,  fra  your  fais  yow  to  defend  I " 


Then  among  them  they  thmight  it  best 
Then  amang  thaira  thai  thocht  It  best, 
And  ordained  for  the  likeliest 
And  ordanyt  for  the  liklyest, 

That  the  queen,  and  the  Earl  also, 
That  the  queyne,  and  the  erle  alsua, 
And  the  ladies,  in  hy  should  go 
And  the  ladyis,  in  hy  suld  ga, 

With  Neil  the  Bruce  ^  to  Kildromy. 
With  Nele  the  bruce,  till  kildromy. 
For  them  thought  they  might  securely 
For  thaim  thocht  thai  mycht  sekyrly 

Dwell  there,  while  they  were  victualled  well ; 
Duell  thar,  quhill  thai  war  wictaillit  weile : 
For  so  stalwart  was  the  castle 
For  swa  stalwart  wes  the  castell, 

That  it  with  strength  were  hard  to  get 
That  It  with  strenth  war  hard  to  get. 
While  that  therein  were  men  and  meat. 
Quhill  that  thar-in  war  men  and  mete. 

As  they  ordained,  they  did  in  hy : 
As  thai  ordanyt,  thai  did  in  hy : 
The  queen  iind  all  her  company 
The  queyne,  and  all  hyr  cunipany, 

1  Nigel  bruce. 


230  Music  and   Poetry 

Leapt  0)1  their  horses  and  forth  they  farc{d). 
Lap  on  thar  horss,  and  fuith  thai  far. 
Men  might  have  seen,  who  had  been  there, 
Men  mycht  haiff  sene,  quha  had  been  thar, 

At  leave-taking  the  ladies  gret  (weep) 
At  leve-takyng  the  ladyis  gret, 
And  make  their  face  with  tears  wet : 
And  male  thar  face  with  teris  wet : 

And  knights  for  their  loves'  sake 
And  knychtis  for  thar  luffis  sak, 
Both  sigh,  and  weep,  and  mourning  make. 
Baith  sich,  and  wep,  and  murnyng  mak. 

They  kissed  their  loves,  at  their  parting. 
Thai  kissyt  thar  luffis,  at  thar  partyng, 
The  king  bethought  him  of  a  thing: 
The  king  bethocht  him  off  A  thing ; 

That  he  from  then  on  foot  luotdd  go. 
That  he  fra-thine  on  fute  wald  ga, 
And  take,  on  foot,  both  weal  and  woe. 
And  tak,  on  fute,  bath  weill  and  wa, 

And  would  no  horsemen  with  him  have. 
And  wald  na  horss-men  with  him  haiff. 
Therefore  his  horses  all    he  gave 
Tharfor  his  horss  all  haile  he  gaiff 

To  the  ladies  that  need  had. 

To  the  ladyis,  that  mystir  had. 

The  queen  forth  on  her  ways  rad  (rode), 

The  queyn  f urth  on  hyr  wayis  rade ; 

And  safely  came  to  the  castli 
And  sawffly  come  to  the  castell, 
Where  her  folk  were  received  well 
Quhar  hyr  folk  war  ressawyt  weill ; 

And  easM  well  with  meat  and  drink. 

And  esyt  weill  with  meyt  and  drynk. 

But  might  none  ease  let  [prevent)  her  to  think 

Bot  mycht  nane  eyss  let  hyr  to  think 


John   Barbour's  Bruce  231 


On  the  king  that  so  sore  was  stad  {bestead) 
On  the  king,  that  sa  sar  wes  stad. 
That  but  ttco  hundred  with  him  had. 
Thot  bot  ij.         C.  with  him  had. 


How  THE  King  and  his  Men  passed  over  Loch  Lomond 
IN  A  Little  Boat. 

TTie  king  saw  how  his  folk  was  stad  (bestead). 
The  king  saw  how  his  folk  wes  stad, 
And  what  annoys  that  they  had. 
And  quhat  anoyis  that  thai  had; 

He  thought  he  to  Canti7-e  woidd go 
He  thocht  he  to  kyntyr  wald  ga, 
A7id  so  long  sojourning  there  make 
And  swa  lang  soiowrnyng  thar  ma. 

Till  winter  weather  were  away. 

Till  wyntir  weddir  war  away ; 

And  then  he  thought  without  tnore  delay 

And  then  he  thocht,  but  mar  delay, 

Into  the  mainland  to  arrive 

In-to  the  manland  till  arywe, 

And  to  the  end  his  Tveirds  {fates)  drivel 

And  till  the  end  hys  werdis  dryw[e]. 

And  for  {because)  Can  tire  lies  in  the  sea, 
And  for  kyntyr  lyis  in  the  Se, 

Sir  Neil  Campbell  before  sent  he 
Schyr  Nele  Cambel  befor  send  he. 

For  to  get  him  navy  (boats)  and  meat. 
For  to  get  him  nawyn         and  meite : 
And  certain  time  to  hint  he  set 
And  ccrtane  tymc  till  him  he  scte, 

1  That  is,  after  winterinj,'  in  Canlire,  he  thoufjlit  he  would  come  back 
to  the  mainland  and  pursue  liis  destiny  — drcc  bis  weird. 


232  Music  and  Poetry 

U7ten  he  should  meet  him  at  the  sea. 
Quhen  he  suld  nieite  him  at  the  se. 
Sir  Neil  Campbell  with  his  meinii 
Schyr  Nele  cambell,  with  his  mengye, 

Wetit  his  way  without  more  letting  [hindering) 
Went  his  way,  but  mar  letting 
And  left  his  brother  with  the  hing. 
And  left  his  brothir  with  the  king. 

The  king,  after  that  he  was  gane  (gone), 
The  king,  eftir  that  he  wes  gane, 
To  Loch  Lomond  the  way  has  ta'en, 
To  lowchlomond  the  way  has  tane, 

And  came  there  on  the  third  day. 
And  come  thar  on  the  thrid  day. 
But  thereabout  no  boat  found  they, 
Bot  thar-about  na  bait  fand  thai, 

That  fnight  them  o'er  the  zvater  bear. 
That  mycht  thaim  our  the  watir  ber . 
Then  were  they  woe  on  great  manner, 
Than  war  thai  wa  on  gret  maner : 

For  it  was  far  about  to  go  (to  go  around,) 
For  It  wes  far  about  to  ga  ; 
And  they  were  in  (to)  doubt  also 
And  thai  war  in-to  dout  alsua, 

To  meet  their  foes  that  spread  were  wide. 
To  meyt  thar  fayis  that  spred  war  wyd. 
Therefore,  along  the  loch's  side 
Tharfor,  endlang  the  louchhis  syd. 

So  busily  they  sought,  and  fast, 
Sa  besyly  thai  socht,  and  fast, 
Till  fames  of  Douglas  at  the  last 
Tyll  lamys  of  dowglas,  at  the  last, 

Found  a  little  sunken  boat 

Fand  A  littill  sonkyn  bate, 

And  to  the  land  it  drew  foot-hot  (quickly). 

And  to  the  land  It  drew,  fut  hate. 


John   Barbour's   Bruce  2^3 

But  il  so  little  was,  that  it 

Bot  It  sa  littill  wes,  that  It 

Might  o'er  the  water  but  three-some'^  flit. 

Mycht  our  the  wattir  bot  thresum  flyt. 

They  sent  thereof  word  to  the  king 
Thai  send  thar-off  word  to  the  king, 
That  was  joyful  of  that  finding. 
That  wes  loyfuU  off  that  fynding ; 

And  first  into  the  boat  is  gane  ; 
And  fyrst  in-to  the  bate  is  gane, 
With  him  Douglas  ;  the  third  was  ane 
With  him  dowglas  ;  the  thrid  wes  ane 

That  rowed  them  o'er  deliver ly  (cleverly) 
That  ro\vyt  thaim  our  deliuerly, 
And  set  them  on  the  land  all  dry  ; 
And  set  thaim  on  the  land  all  dry : 

And  rowed  so  oft-times  to  and  fro, 
And  rowyt  sa  oft-syss  to  &  fra, 
Fetching  aye  o'er  two  and  two, 
Fechand  ay  our  twa  &  twa, 

That  in  a  night  and  in  a  day 
That  in  A  nycht  and  in  A  day, 
Come  out  o'er  the  loch  are  they. 
Cummyn  owt  our  the  louch  ar  thai. 

For  some  of  them  could  swim  full  well 
For  sum  off  thaim  couth  swome  full  weill, 
And  on  his  back  bear  a  fardil  (fack). 
And  on  his  bak  ber  a  fardele. 

So  with  swimming  and  with  rowing 
Swa  with  swymmyng,  and  with  rowyng 
They  brought  them  o'er,  and  all  their  thing. 
Thai  brocht  thaim  our,  and  all  thar  thing. 

The  king,  the  whiles,  merrily 
The  king,  the  quhilis,  meryly 
Read  to  them  that  were  him  by 
Red  to  thaim  that  war  him  by, 

1  With  three  in  it. 


234  Music  and  Poetry 

Romance  ofuwrthy  Feramhrace 
Konianys  off  worth i  ferambrace 
That  -worthily  overcome  («)  was 
That  worthily  oer-cummyn  was 


The  good  kitig  upon  this  mannlr 
The  gud  king,  apon  this  maner, 
Comforted  them  that  were  him  near, 
Comfort[yt]  thaim  that  war  him  ner  ; 

And  made  them  games  and  solace 
And  maid  thaim  gamyn  [and]  solace 
Till  that  his  folk  all  passed  was. 
Till  that  his  folk  all  passyt  was. 


How  THE  Earl  of  Lennox,  who  had  retired  to  these 
Hills  thinking  that  the  King  was  dead,  joyfully 

RAN   TO   MEET   HIM   WHEN    HE   HEARD   HIS    HORN    BLOW. 

They  had  full  great  default  of  meat, 
Thai  had  full  gret  defaut  off  mete, 
And  therefore,  venison  to  get. 
And  tharfor  venesoun  to  get 

[n  t'lVO  parties  are  they  gane. 
In  twa  partyss  ar  thai  gayne. 

The  king  himself  was  in  to  ane, 
The  king  him-selff  wes  in-till  ane ; 

And  Sir  James  of  Douglas 
And  Schyr  lames  off  Dowglas 
hito  the  f  other  party  was. 
In-to  the  tothir  party  was. 

Then  to  the  height  they  held  their  way, 
Then  to  the  hycht  thai  held  thar  way, 
And  hmited  longivhile  of  the  day, 
And  huntyt  lang  quhill  off  the  day; 

Atid  sought  shaws  (woods)  and  traps  set ; 
And  soucht  schawys  and  Setis  set ; 


John   Barbour's  Bruce  235 

But  they  got  little  for  to  eat. 
Bot  thai  gat  litill  for  till  ete. 

Then  happened  at  that  time  per  case  {by  chance) 
Then  hapnyt  at  that  tyme  percass, 
That  the  Earl  of  the  Lennox  was 
That  the  Erie  of  the  Leuenax  was 

Among  the  hills  near  thereby; 
Amang  the  hillis,  ner  tharby; 
And  when  he  heard  so  blo7u  and  cry, ^ 
And  quhen  he  hard  sa  blaw  &  cry, 

He  had  wonder  what  it  might  be  ; 

He  had  wondir  quhat  It  myclit  lie  ; 

And  on  such  manner  speerld  {tracked,  spyed)  he 

And  on  sic  maner  spyryt  he, 

That  he  knew  that  it  was  the  kins;: 

That  [he]  knew  that  It  wes  the  king : 

And  then,  without  {en)  more  d^uelling  {hesitatifig), 

And  then,  for-owtyn  mar  duelling, 

With  all  them  of  his  company 
With  all  thaim  off  his  cumpany, 
I/e  went  right  to  the  king  in  hy. 
He  went  rycht  till  the  king  in  hy, 

So  blythe  and  so  joyful  that  he 
Sa  blyth  and  sa  loyfull,  that  he 
Might  on  no  manner  blither  be. 
Mycht  on  na  maner  blyther  be. 

For  he  the  king  weened  {thought)  had  been  dead ; 
For  he  the  king  wend  had  bene  ded  ; 

And  he  was  also  will  of  red  ^ 
And  he  wes  alsua  will  off  red, 

That  he  durst  rest  into  no  place  ; 
That  he  durst  rest  in-to  na  place  ; 

1  That  is,  the  horn-blowing  and  crying  of  the  king's  people,  in  hunting. 

2  "  Will  of  red"  is  an  id'wmMc  phrdisc  meaning  wild  of  rede  or  counsel, 
that  is,  at  a  loss  what  to  do. 


236  Music  and  Poetry 

A'or,  si7ue  the  king  discovifil{ed)  was 
Na,  sen  the  king  discunifyt  was 

At  Methveit,  he  heard  ne-.'er  thing. 
At  meffan,  he  herd  neuir  thing 
That  ex>er  -was  certain,  of  the  king. 
That  euir  vves  certane  off  the  king. 

Therefore,  in  {to)  full  great  dainty  {fond  delight,) 
Tharfor,  in-to  full  gret  daynte, 
The  king  full  humbly  greeted  he  ; 
The  king  full  humyly  haylist  he; 

And  he  him  luehomed  right  blithely. 
And  he  him  welcummyt  rycht  blythly, 
And  kissM  him  full  tenderly. 
And  [kyssyt]  him  full  tendirly. 

And  all  the  lords  that  were  there 
And  all  the  lordis,  that  war  thar, 
Right  joyful  of  their  meeting  were, 
Rycht  loyful  off  thar  meting  war, 

And  kissid  him  in  great  dainty. 
And  kissyt  him  in  gret  daynte. 
//  was  great  pity  for  to  see 
It  was  gret  pite  for  till  Se 

How  they  for  joy  and  pity  gret  {wept) 
How  thai  for  loy  and  pite  gret, 
Wheti  that  they  with  their  fellows  met 
Quhen  that  thai  with  thar  falow[is]  met, 

That  they  weened  had  been  dead ;  for  thi  {for  this) 
That  thai  wend  had  bene  dede  ;  forthi 
They  welcomed  him  more  heartfidly. 
Thai  welcummyt  him  mar  hartfully. 

And  he  for  pity  gret  {wept)  again. 
And  he  for  pite  gret  agayne, 

That  never  of  meeting  was  so  f  tin. 
That  neuir  off  metyng  wes  sa  fayne. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  237 

Though  I  say  that  they  gret,  soothly 
Thocht  I  say  that  thai  gret,  sothly, 
It  -was  no  greting properly. 
It  wes  na  greting  propyrly : 


But  I  wot  well,  without  lying, 
Bot  1  I  wate  weill,  but  i  lesyng, 
Whatever  vien  say  of  such  greting, 
Quhat  euir  men  say  off  sic  greting. 

That  micklejoy,  or  yet  pity. 
That  mekill  loy,  or  yeit  pete, 
May  gar  {cause)  men  so  a-imned  be 
May  ger  men  sua  amowyt  be, 

That  water  from  the  heart  will  rise, 
That  watir  fra  the  hart  will  ryss, 
And  wet  the  eyne  {eyes)  on  such  a  wise. 
And  weyt  the  eyne        on  sic  a  \vyss. 

The  Earl  had  meat,  and  that  plenty. 
The  Erie  had  mete,  and  that  plente, 
And  with  glad  heart  it  them  gave  he. 
And  with  glaid  hart  It  thaim  gaiff  he ; 

And  they  ate  it  with  full  good  will. 

And  thai  eyt  It  with  full  gud  will, 

That  sought  7ione  other  sauce  theretill  {there  to) 

That  soucht  [nane  othir]  salss  thar-till 

But  appetite,  that  oft  men  takes  ; 
Bot  appetyt,  that  oft  men  takys ; 
l-'or  well  scoured  were  their  stomachs. 
For  wcill  scowryt  war  ihar  stomakys. 


And  they  full  piteously  'gan  tell 
And  thai  full  pitwysly  gan  tell 

1  With  Barbour,  "bot"  is  the  modern  iut,  and  "  but"  is  the  modern 
without. 


oog  Music  and  Poetry 

Adventuris  that  them  be  fell, 
Auenturis  that  thaim  befell, 

And  great  annoys  and  poverty. 
And  grct  anoyis,  and  powerte. 
Tie  hing  thereat  had  great  pity. 
The  king  thar-at  had  gret  pile : 

And  told  them  piteously  again 
And  tauld  thaim  petwisly  agayne 
The  annoy,  the  travail,  and  the  pain 
The  noy,  the  trawaill,  and  the  payne, 

That  he  had  tholed  (suffered)  since  he  them  saw. 
That  he  had  tholyt,  sen  he  thaim  saw. 

Was  none  among  them,  high  nor  low, 
Wes  nane  amang  thaim,  hey  na  law, 

That  he  not  had  pity  and  pleasance 
That  he  ne  had  pite  and  plesaunce, 
When  that  he  heard  7nake  remembrance 
Quhen  that  he  herd  mak  remembrance 

Of  the  perils  that  passed  were. 
Off  the  perellys  that  passyt  war. 
For,  when  men  aught  at  ease  are, 
[For]  quhen  men  oucht  at  liking  ar, 

To  tell  of  pains  passld  by 
To  tell  off  paynys  passyt  by 
Pleases  to  hearing  wonderly. 
Plesys  to  heryng  [wonderly]. 

And  to  rehearse  their  old  dis-ease  {pain) 
And  to  reherss  thar  auld  disese 
Does  them  ofttimes  comfort  and  ease, 
Dois  thaim  oft-syss  confort  and  ese ; 

So  [provided)  that  thereto  follow  no  blame, 
With-thi  thar-to  folow  na  blame, 

Dishonor,  wickedness,  nor  shame. 
Dishonour,  wikytnes,  na  schame. 


John   Barbour's  Bruce  239 

How  King  Robert  was  chased  with  a  Sleuth-hound  in 
Galloway;  and  how  he  fought  alone  against  Two 
Hundred,  at  a  Ford. 

Attd  "when  the  Gallowese^  wist  soothly 
And  quhen  the  gallowais  vist  suthly 
That  he  was  with  a  few  meinie, 
That  he  wes  with  a  few  menyhe, 
They  made  a  secret  assembly 
Thai  maid  a  preue  assemble 

Of  well  two  hundred  men  and  ma  [more). 
Off  Weill  twa  hundreth  men  &  ma. 
A  sleuth-hound  with  them  'gan  they  ta '  ( take) 
Ana  sluth-hwnd  vith  thaim  can  thai  ta ; 


They  shaped  them  {intended),  in  an  ez'ening 
Thai  schupe  thame,  in  ane  evynnyng, 

Suddenly  to  surprise  the  king, 
.Suddandly  to  suppriss  the  king, 

And  to  him  held  they  straight  their  way. 
And  till  him  held  thai  straucht  thar  way. 
But  he,  that  had  his  watches  aye 
Bot  he,  that  had  his  vachis  ay 

On  each  side,  of  their  coming 

On  ilk  syde,  of  thar  cummyng, 

Long  ere  they  came  —  had  wittering  {knowledge); 

Lang  or  thai  com,  had  vittering ; 

And  went  him  doivn  to  a  morass. 
And  vent  hym  doune  till  a  marrass, 
On  a  water  that  running  was; 
On  a  vattir  that  rynand  was  ; 

1  The  men  of  Galloway.  Bruce,  after  many  adventures  by  sea  and  land 
—  omitted  in  these  brief  extracts  —  has  come  over  into  his  own  earldom  of 
Carrick,  and  wanders  about  there,  having  but  sixty  men  as  his  meinie. 


-240  Music  and  Poetry 

Ami  hi  a  doj,'  he  found  a  place 

And  iu  a  bog  he  fand  a  place 

Full  straight  {very  narrow),  that  well  two  bowdratightwas 

Veil!  strate,  that  well  twa  bowdraucht  was, 

From  (where)  they  the  water  passid  had. 
Yx7\.  thai  the  vattir  passit  had : 

He  said  "  here  may  ye  make  abode  {stop) 
He  said,  "  heir  may  yhe  mak  abade ; 

Aftd  rest  you  all  a  while  and  lie. 
And  rest  yow  all  a  quhile  and  ly. 
/  will  go  watch  you  privily 
I  will  ga  vach  yow  preuely, 

If  I  hear  aught  of  their  cotiung  ; 
Gi£f  I  heir  oucht  of  thar  cummyng; 
And  if  I  may  hear  anything 
And  gif  I  may  heir  ony  thyng, 

I  shall  gar  warn  you,  so  that  we 
I  sail  ger  varn  yow,  sua  that  we 
Shall  aye  at  our  advantage  be." 
Sail  ay  at  our  avantage  be." 


Sir  Gilbert  de  la  Hay  left  he 
And  schir  gilbert  de  [la]  hay  left  he 
There,  for  to  rest  with  his  meinie. 
Thar  for  to  rest  with  his  menylie. 

To  the  2uater  he  came  in  hy, 
To  the  vattir  he  com  in  hy, 
And  listened  full  intently 
And  lisnyt  full  ententily 

If  he  aught  heard  of  their  coming : 
Gif  he  oucht  herd  of  thare  cumuiyng ; 
But  yet  then  might  he  hear  no  thing. 
Bot  yeit  than  mycht  he  heir  na  thing. 

Endlong  {along)  the  water  then  went  he 
Endlang  the  vattir  than  yeid  he 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  241 

On  either  side  great  quantity  [distance); 
On  athir  syde  great  quantite  ; 

He  saw  the  braes  (banks)  high  stajidmg, 
He  saw  the  brayis  hye  standand, 

The  water  all  through  mire  rzoimng, 
The  vattir  holl  throu  slike  rynand, 

And  found  no  ford  that  men  might  pass 
And  fand  na  furd  that  men  mycht  pas 
But  where  himself  o'er  passid  was. 
Bot  quhar  hymself  [our]  passit  was. 

And  so  straight  {narrow)  was  the  up-coming"^ 
And  sua  strate  wes  the  vp-cumm}Tig, 

That  two  men  might  not  together  thring  {throng). 
That  twa  men  mycht  nocht  sammyn  thryng, 


His  two  men  bade  he  then  in  hy 
His  twa  men  bad  he  than  in  hy 
Go  to  their  feres  (mates)  to  rest  and  lie. 
Ga  to  thair  feris  to  rest  and  ly ; 

"  Sir  "  —  said  they  —  "  who  shall  with  you  be  ?  " 
Schir,"  said  they,  "  quha  sail  vith  yow  be  ? " 

"  God"  —  he  said —  "  withottten  ma  (more). 
"God,"  he  said,  "forouten  ma; 
Pass  on,  for  I  will  it  be  sa." 
Pas  on,  for  I  will  it  be  swa." 

They  did  as  he  them  bidden  had, 

Thai  did  as  he  thanie  biddin  had, 
And  he  there  all  alone  abade  (abode). 
And  he  thar  all  allane  abaid. 

When  he  a  while  had  bided  there, 

Quhen  he  a  quhile  had  biddin  thare, 

And  harbored  (waited  lurkini;),  he  heard  as  it  were 

And  hcrbryit,  he  herd  as  it  war 

1  The  ascent  up  the  bank  from  the  ford, 
16 


242  Music  and   Poetry 

A  hound's  questing  {hunting)  upon  far  {afar) 
A  hundis  quhistlyng  apoii  fer, 

That  aye  came  to  him  near(er)  and  near(er). 
That  ay  com  till  him  ner  &  ner. 

//e  stood  stiti  for  to  hearken  mair  (more) 
He  stude  still  for  till  herkyn  mair, 
And  aye  the  longer  zvhile  he  was  there 
And  ay  the  langer  quhill  he  wes  thair, 

He  heard  it  near{er)  and  near(er)  comand  [coming); 
He  herd  it  ner  and  ner  cumand ; 

But  he  there  still  thought  he  would  stand 
Bot  he  thair  still  thoucht  he  vald  stand, 

Till  that  he  heard  more  tokening ; 
Till  that  he  herd  mair  taknyng ; 
For,  for  a  hound's  questing 
For,  for  a  hundis  quhestlyng. 

He  would  not  waken  his  meinie. 
He  wald  nocht  vvalkyn  his  menyhe. 
Therefore  he  would  abide  and  see 
Tharf or  he  walde  abyde  and  se 

What  folk  they  were,  and  whether  they 
Quhat  folk  thai  war,  &  quhethir  thai 
Held  toward  him  the  right  way 
Held  toward  him  the  rycht  vay, 

Or  passhl  another  way  far  by. 
Or  pas[syt]  ane  othir  way  fer  by. 
The  moon  was  shining  right  clearly. 
The  moyn  wes  schynand  rycht  cleirly, 

And  so  long  stood  he  harkenhnd  {harkening) 
And  sua  lang  stude  he  herkynand, 
Till  that  he  sazv  come  at  his  hand 
Till  that  he  saw  cum  at  his  hand 

The  whole  rout  in  full  great  hy. 
The  haill  rowt,  in  full  gret  hy; 
Then  he  bethought  him  hastily 
Than  he  vmbethocht  him  hastely. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  243 

If  hi-  went  to  fetch  his  meinie 
Gif  he  yeid  to  feche  his  menyhe, 
That  ere  he  might  repaired  be  {come  back) 
That,  or  he  mycht  reparit  be, 

They  should  be  past  the  ford,  each  ane. 
Thai  suld  be  passit  the  furde  ilkane. 
And  then  behooved  he  chose  him  ane  ^ 
And  than  behufit,  he  chesit  him  ane 

Of  these  t%uo,  either  to  flee  or  die. 
Of  thir  twa,  outhir  to  fle  or  de. 
But  his  heart,  that  7vas  stout  atid  high, 
Bot  his  hert,  that  wes  stout  and  he, 

Counselled  him  alone  to  bide 
Consalit  hym  allane  to  byde, 
And  keep  them  at  the  forces  side 
And  kep  thame  at  the  furdis  syde, 

And  defend  well  the  up-coming, 
And  defend  weill  the  vp-cummyng, 
Since  he  was  provided  with  arming  {armor) 
Sen  he  was  varnysit  of  Armyng 

That  he  their  arrows  need  not  dread. 
That  he  thair  Arravis  [thurt]  nocht  dreid. 
For  if  he  were  of  great  manhead  {manhood) 
For  gif  he  war  of  gret  manheid, 

He  might  stonish  them  every  ane 

He  mycht  stonay  thame  [euir]  ilkane 

Since  they  could  come  but  ane  and  ane  {one  at  a  time). 

Sen  thai  mycht  cum  bot  ane  and  ane. 

Theretoith  he  to  the  ford  'gan  go 
Thar-vith  he  to  the  furd  can  ga; 

A7td  they  upon  the  t'other  party, 
And  thai,  apon  the  tothir  party 

1  And  then  it  was  necessary  (beliooved)  that  he  should  choose  one  of 
these  two,  cither  to  flee  or  die. 


244  Music  and  Poetry 

That  saw  him  stand  there  one-sotncly  {alone). 
That  saw  him  stand  thair  anerly, 

Thronging  into  the  water  rade  (rode)  ; 
Thryngand  in[-til]]  the  vattir  raid; 
J^or  of  him  liUle  doubt  they  had  [sure  they  had  him) 
For  of  him  litill  dout  thai  had, 

And  rode  to  him  in  full  great  hy. 
And  raid  till  him  in  full  gret  hy. 
He  s7note  the  first  so  rigorously 
He  smat  the  first  sa  r3'gorusly 

With  his  spear,  that  right  sharply  share  {sheared,  cut), 
Vith  his  spare,  that  rycht  scharply  schare, 
Till  he  down  to  the  earth  him  bare. 
Till  he  doun  to  the  erd  hym  bare. 

The  lave  (rest)  came  then  in  a  randoun  (at random), 
The  laif  com  than  in  a  randoune, 

But  his  horse  that  was  borne  dozvn 
Bot  his  hors,  that  wes  born  doune, 

Cumbered  them  the  up-gang  (ascent)  to  ta'  (take). 
Cummerit  thaim  the  vpgang  to  ta. 

And  when  the  king  saw  it  was  sa  (so) 
And  quhen  the  kyng  saw  it  wes  sua, 

He  stickM  the  horse,  and  he  'gan  fling 
He  stekit  the  hors,  and  he  can  flyng, 
And  then  fell  at  the  up-coming. 
And  syne  fell  at  the  vpcummyng. 

The  lave  (rest),  with  that,  came  7uith  a  shout, 
The  laif  with  that  com  [with]  a  schowt. 

And  he,  that  stalwart  was  and  stout. 
And  he  that  stalward  wes  and  stout, 

Met  them  right  stoutly  at  the  brae 
Met  thame  rycht  stoutly  at  the  bra, 
And  so  good  payment  'gan  them  ma  (make) 
And  sa  gud  payment  can  thaim  ma. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  245 

That  five-some  in  the  ford  he  slew. 

That  fiff  sum  in  the  furd  he  slew. 

The  lave  then  some-deal  [somewhat)  them  withdrew, 

The  laif  than  sumdeill  thaim  vith-drew, 

That  dread{ed)  his  strokes  wonder  sore, 

That  dred  his  strakis  voundir  sare ; 

For  he  in  no  thing  them  forbare  (spared  them  not). 

For  he  in  na  thing  thame  forbare. 

Then  one  said  " certes  (certainly)  we  are  to  blame: 
Than  ane  said  "  certis,  we  ar  to  blame ; 

What  shall  we  say  when  we  come  hame  (home), 
Quhat  sail  we  say  quhen  we  cum  hame, 

When  one  man  fights  against  us  all? 
Quhen  a  man  fechtis  agains  vs  all  ? 
Who  wist  ever  men  so  foidly  fall 
Quha  vist  euir  men  sa  fouly  fall 

As  us,  if  that  we  thus-gate  leave  !  " 
As  vs,  gif  that  we  thusgat  leif !  " 
With  that  all  whole  a  shout  they  gave 
With  that  all  haill  a  schout  thai  [geve], 

And  cried  "  On  him  !     He  may  not  last." 
And  cryit  "  on  hym !  he  may  nocht  [last]." 
With  that  they  pressed  him  so  fast 
Vith  that  thai  presit  hym  so  fast, 

That  had  he  not  the  better  been 
That  had  he  nocht  the  bettir  beyn, 
I/e  had  been  dead  withouten  veyn  (doubt). 
He  had  beyn  ded  forouten  veyn. 

But  he  so  great  defence  'gan  make 
Bot  he  sa  gret  defens  can  mak, 

That  where  he  hit  with  even  strake  (stroke) 
That,  quhar  he  hit,  with  evin  strak, 

There  might  no  thing  against  it  stand. 
Thar  mycht  no  thing  agane  it  stand. 
///  little  space  (while)  he  left  lyhnd  (lying) 
In  litill  space  he  left  lyand 


246  Music  and  Poetry 

Softie  {man}')  that  the  up-come  'Mas  then, 
Sa  feill  that  the  vpcom  wes  then 

Stopped  up  with  slain  horses  and  tnen, 
Dittit  with  slayn  hors  and  men; 

So  that  his  foes,  for  that  stopping, 
Swa  that  his  fayis,  for  that  stopping, 
Might  (could )  not  come  to  the  up-com)ng. 
Micht  nocht  cum  to  the  vp-cummyng. 

Ah,  dear  God!  who  had  been  by 
A !  deir  god !  quha  had  beyn  by, 
And  seen  how  he  so  hardily 
And  seyn  how  he  sa  hardely 

Addressed  him-  against  them  all, 
Adressit  him  agane  thame  all, 
/  wot  well  that  they  should  him  call 
I  wat  Weill  that  thai  suld  him  call 

The  best  that  lived  into  his  day  ; 
The  best  that  liffit  in-till  his  day  ; 
And  if  that  I  the  sooth  (truth)  shall  say. 
And  gif  that  I  the  suth  sail  say, 

/  heard  ttevcr  in  no  time  gone 
I  herd  neuir  in  na  tyme  gane 
One  stint  {stop)  so  many,  him  alone. 
Ana  stynt  sa  mony  hym  allane. 


Till  he  such  martyrdom  there  made 
Till  he  sic  martirdome  thair  maid, 
That  he  the  ford  all  stopped  had, 
That  he  the  furde  all  stoppit  had, 

That  none  of  them  might  to  him  ride. 
That  nane  of  thame  mycht  till  him  ryde. 
Then  thought  them  folly  for  to  bide. 
Than  thoucht  thame  foly  for  to  byde, 

And  wholly  the  flight  'gan  ta'  {take) 
And  halely  the  flicht  can  ta. 
And  went  hameward  where  they  came  fra. 
And  went  hamvard  quhar  thai  com  fra. 


John  Barbour's  Bruce  247 


For  the  king's  men  with  that  cry 
For  the  kingis  men  with  that  cry 
Wakened,  and  full  affrightedly 
Valknyt,  and  full  affraitly 

Came  for  to  seek  their  lord  the  king: 
Com  for  to  seik  thair  lord  the  king. 
The  Gallmvay  men  heard  their  coming 
The  galloway  men  herd  thair  cummyng, 

And  fled,  that  durst  not  bide  no  mair. 
And  fled,  that  durst  nocht  byde  na  nair. 
The  king's  tnen,  that  dreading  'were 
The  kingis  men,  that  dredand  wair 

For  their  lord,  full  speedily 
For  thai  lord,  full  spedaly 
Came  to  the  ford  and  soon  in  hy 
Com  to  the  furde  and  soyn  in  hy 

They  found  the  king  sitting  alane, 
Thai  fand  the  kyng  sytand  alane, 

That  off  his  basrnet  {helmet)  then  had  ta'en 
That  of  his  basnet  than  had  tane 

To  take  the  air,  for  he  'was  hot. 

To  tak  the  air,  for  he  wes  hate. 

Then  speered  (asked)  they  at  him  of  his  state. 

Than  sperit  thai  at  him  of  his  stat ; 

And  he  told  them  all  whole  the  case  : 
And  he  told  thaim  all  haill  the  cass, 
Ilow-gatc  that  he  assailid  'was, 
Howgat  that  he  assalyeit  was, 

And  haw  that  God  him  helpid  sa 
And  how  that  god  hym  helpit  sua, 
That  he  escapid  whole  them  fra. 
That  he  eschapit  haill  thamc  fra. 

Then  lookid  they  hoiu  frle  (many)  were  dead. 
Than  lukit  thai  how  fcill  war  dcd, 

And  they  found  lying  in  that  stead  (place) 
And  thai  fand  Hand  in  that  sted 


248  Music  and   Poetry 

Fourteen  that  slain  ivcrc  with  his  hand. 
Fourteyn  that  slayn  war  vith  his  hand. 
Then  praised  they  God  fast,  all-will dhnd} 
Than  lovit  thai  god  fast,  all-veldand, 

That  they  their  lord  found  whole  and  fair  (sound), 
That  thai  thar  lord  fand  haill  and  fcir ; 
And  said:  "  them  behooved  in  no  maiinir 
And  said :  "  thai[m]  byrd  on  na  maner 

Dread  their  foes,  since  their  chieftain 
Dreid  thair  fais,  sen  thair  chiftane 
Was  of  such  heart  and  of  such  main  [strength) 
Wes  of  sic  hert  and  of  sic  mane, 

That  he  for  them  had  undertaken 
That  he  for  thame  had  vndirtane 
With  sofelefolk  to  fight,  him  ane" 
With  sa  feill  folk  to  fecht  him  ane." 

1  All-wielding,  that  is,  almighty. 


||,^?,^!||'^f^'pAL  LIBRARY  FACILITY 

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